For most of OnlyFans' history, the growth story has been an English-speaking story. The US, the UK, Canada, Australia — those four markets together accounted for over 70% of platform fan spending through 2023. That distribution has been quietly shifting, and Italy is the clearest example of where it's heading.
Italian fans spent $355 million on OnlyFans in 2025, up from $286M in 2024 — a 24% year-on-year increase. That growth rate isn't just high; it's the highest among the platform's top ten markets, and roughly double the platform-wide growth rate of about 12%. The Italian market is, in net terms, adding spending faster than Germany, France, Spain, or the Netherlands.
The data
Here's the full picture of the Italian OnlyFans market in 2025:
| Metric | Italy 2025 | Italy 2024 | YoY change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total fan spending | $355M | $286M | +24% |
| Active fans | ~6.8M | ~5.9M | +15% |
| Annual ARPU (per fan) | $52 | $48 | +8% |
| Active creators | ~7,000 | ~6,250 | +12% |
| Avg creator monthly | $4,800 | $4,100 | +17% |
| Platform median (active) | $367 | $340 | +8% |
Three numbers jump out. First, Italian fans spend an average of $52 per year on the platform, versus a global average of about $19/year — a 2.7× ARPU multiple. Second, the average active Italian creator earns $4,800/month against a platform-wide active-creator median of $367 — a 13× multiple. Third, both the fan-side and the creator-side metrics are growing in tandem, which is rare in a creator-economy market. Usually one side leads (more creators flood in faster than fan spending, or vice versa). In Italy, both are growing, and the platform's per-creator economics are getting better, not worse.
Why Italy specifically
Three structural factors are driving the Italian boom, and they reinforce each other in ways that are hard to replicate elsewhere.
1. Cultural normalization
Through 2022, OnlyFans coverage in Italian mainstream press was largely scandalized — most articles framed the platform as either a moral problem or a curiosity. From late 2023 onward, that framing shifted measurably. Major Italian outlets (Corriere, Repubblica, Il Post) began running profiles of Italian creators as small-business stories: how much they earn, how they manage their accounts, how they handle taxes. The press normalization correlates closely with the fan-spending growth, with a lag of about 6 months. This is the same pattern we observed in the US around 2020-2021 (Bella Thorne's launch, COVID-era press) and in the UK around 2022.
2. Economic dynamics
Italy has a structural youth-unemployment problem — about 22% youth unemployment in 2025, well above the EU average. Creator-economy income is, for many young Italians, a primary income strategy rather than a side hustle. That's reflected in the average Italian creator's monthly take ($4,800), which is meaningfully higher than the comparable figure for major-market creators in countries with lower youth unemployment. The pressure to professionalize is higher, and that translates into production discipline.
3. Regulatory permissiveness vs Spain and France
Italy's regulatory environment for adult content is, in practice, more permissive than Spain's or France's. Spain has been moving toward mandatory age-verification for adult platforms with significant compliance costs. France's Arcom enforcement against non-compliant adult sites has been aggressive since 2024. Italy has not (yet) followed either, leaving Italian creators and fans with a frictionless platform experience that Spanish and French users increasingly don't have.
That regulatory gap is the most fragile of the three factors. If Italy implements EU-equivalent age-verification — which is plausibly on the legislative agenda for 2026-2027 — the growth rate would compress. We'd expect a one-time hit of 8-15 ppts of YoY growth in the year of implementation, similar to the pattern we observed in France in 2024.
In context: Italy vs the major markets
Top Italian creators and the agency scene
The Italian creator scene has consolidated rapidly around a small number of agencies and a recognizable cohort of top creators. Three Milan-based creator-management firms collectively represent roughly 38% of the top-1000 Italian creator population — a concentration ratio meaningfully higher than the equivalent figure for the US or UK agency scenes. That concentration has been a growth accelerant: the top Italian agencies have direct media relationships that the US/UK equivalents lack, which has kept the cultural-normalization flywheel turning.
Italian top creators tend to operate within a tighter price band than top US creators — fewer $50+ subscriptions, more $9.99-$14.99 with heavy PPV monetization. The Italian PPV unlock rate (the percentage of subscribers who buy at least one PPV unlock per month) is among the highest on the platform at roughly 31%, against a global average of about 19%. Italian creators are extracting more per fan, partly because the cultural framing of OnlyFans-as-small-business has lowered fan price resistance.
What other markets look set to follow
Italy didn't grow in isolation. The structural factors that produced the Italian boom — cultural normalization, structural unemployment among the relevant cohort, regulatory permissiveness — exist to varying degrees in several other markets. The short list of "next Italy" candidates, in approximate order of plausibility:
Brazil (#1 candidate)
Brazilian fan spending grew 19% YoY in 2025. Brazilian creator counts are up 23%. The cultural normalization is happening (Folha, O Globo profiles) but slower than Italy. The regulatory environment is permissive. Currency volatility is a drag on absolute spending. Expected 2026 growth: 22-28%.
Spain (with caveats)
Spain's underlying market is similar to Italy's (cultural framing, demographics) but the age-verification regulatory move in 2025-2026 has compressed growth to single digits. If the regulation lands with manageable compliance, Spain could catch up; if it lands with high friction, growth stays subdued. Expected 2026 growth: 6-12%.
Mexico
Mexican fan spending grew 16% in 2025. Latin American press coverage has been normalizing OnlyFans rapidly. The constraint is cross-border payments friction — Mexican fans more frequently rely on alternative payment methods, which the platform has historically supported unevenly. Expected 2026 growth: 18-25%.
Poland
Smaller in absolute terms but growing fast (+27% in 2025 from a smaller base). Polish creator economy is genuinely nascent — most cultural normalization still ahead. Could become the surprise European market by 2027.
Caveats journalists should note
Three things worth flagging when citing the Italian numbers:
- "Italian" is operationally defined as fan-side geolocation, not nationality. The figure includes Italian residents who pay from Italy, regardless of citizenship. The creator-side figure is similar — based on stated location plus payment-routing geolocation.
- The 2024 base year was already elevated. Italy's 2023 spending was about $214M. The 2023→2024 jump was 34% (the headline growth), and the 2024→2025 jump (24%) is a deceleration from that peak. The market is still growing fast, but the parabolic phase may be ending.
- Italian creator earnings figures are agency-survey-weighted. The $4,800/mo average leans on three Milan agencies whose portfolios may skew higher than the cross-sectional Italian creator population. The platform-wide median active-creator figure ($367/mo) is computed differently and isn't directly comparable; the right framing is "Italian creators in agency portfolios" vs "Italian creators in the unmanaged population."
Predictions for 2026 and 2027
- Italy will overtake Germany as the #3 European market by mid-2026. Germany's growth has been 8-10% YoY; Italy at 24% closes the gap mechanically.
- Italian fan ARPU will cross $60/year by end of 2026. Driven by deeper PPV penetration and the continued upward shift in average subscription price.
- Brazil and Mexico will collectively become a $700M+ market by 2027. Currently sub-$500M combined; the LatAm normalization is happening on the Italian trajectory but at LatAm scale.
- Italy will face age-verification legislation in 2027. Likely to land in Q3-Q4 2027. Expect a one-time growth compression of 8-15 ppts in the year of implementation. Long-run effect is probably neutral after creators adapt to the new compliance costs.
- The "Italian model" will become a recognized agency export. The Milan-based agencies will start selling their model into other Latin-European markets. Expect at least one major cross-border agency by mid-2027.
Methodology
Italian market figures combine four data sources:
- Geolocation-weighted Stripe processing data — payment-side routing data from Italy-located cards is the primary source for total spending. The figure of $355M is post-fee gross — what fans pay, before OnlyFans's 20% take.
- Agency creator-management panel — three Milan-based agencies shared anonymized creator-portfolio data covering ~2,400 active Italian creators. The agency panel is weighted toward higher-revenue creators; the cross-sectional Italian creator figure adjusts for this.
- Public-press creator profiles — Italian-press profiles of named creators provide a check on the upper-tail; the panel-derived top-10% figure for Italian creators is consistent with reported earnings in those profiles.
- Italian press-coverage volume index — we tracked Italian-language press coverage of OnlyFans (article counts, sentiment) as a leading indicator. The press-volume index leads the fan-spending growth by approximately 6 months in 2023-2025.
All figures are 2025 calendar-year USD, currency-converted at year-average EUR/USD rates. The ARPU figure ($52 vs global $19) uses active-fan denominators (fans with at least one subscription or PPV unlock in the 12-month window), not registered accounts. The creator-count figure for Italy (~7,000 active) uses the platform's stated-location field, validated against payment-routing geolocation; misclassification is estimated at ±8%.
See the Europe regional page for the full cross-country breakdown and the methodology page for our broader geographic-attribution approach.