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The “link-in-bio” has quietly become one of the most important features in the creator economy.
What started as a simple workaround for Instagram’s single-link limitation has evolved into a multi-billion-click gateway - dominated for years by Linktree. But over the past five years, the space has exploded with challengers and major platforms racing to own this critical piece of the creator tech stack.
One of those challengers was KOMI, where I spent nearly three years as the product manager leading its link-in-bio product.
With Groover’s recent acquisition of Temple (a link-in-bio for musicians) and Shopify’s decision earlier this year to retire Linkpop, it feels like the right moment to break down:
The evolution of the link-in-bio category
Why it’s so difficult to win as a standalone tool
When it actually makes sense to launch one
Why every company ends up with the same positioning
2026 predictions
1. The evolution of the link-in-bio category
Wave 1: The monopoly years
Linktree is arguably the best proof that distribution & brand is more important than product.
Despite the remarkably basic product, they have amassed over 50m users with the combination of a free product and super effective PLG (product led growth) watermark-loop, ensuring a constant stream of free traffic and brand awareness.
Wave 2: The challenger era
That level of success, combined with the lack of product quality and innovation invited a ton of ambitious entrepreneurs to launch competitors
Platforms like KOMI, Beacons and Stan all entered with superior products, each specialising in some way; KOMI focusing on design and functionality, Stan on commerce, Beacons on features and additional tooling eg media kits.
Wave 3: The web-builder awakening
The website platforms (Squarespace, Wix, Shopify) recognized that traffic was increasingly coming from social, and they were leaving themselves vulnerable to whichever platform owned the link-in-bio real estate
Squarespace rolled out bio.sites, Shopify launched Linkpop (RIP) and Wix introduced Hopp, each offering it for free.
Wave 4: the horizontal expansion
Non-website platforms like Later (social scheduling & analytics) and Groover (promotion platform for musicians) begin to enter the link-in-bio market with Linkin.bio and Temple.
Now that we’ve got an understanding of who’s competing in the market, let’s dive into why it’s so tough…