When it comes to social media, JAY-Z is off that.
In his wide-ranging interview with Kevin Hart for Peacock’s “Hart to Heart,” the hip-hop icon opened up about his relationship with social media and why he doesn’t use it.
“It’s not for me. It’s not for me to engage. I didn’t grow up in that space,” he told the comedian.
The Roc Nation mogul did attempt to join Instagram twice, once in November 2021 after being persuaded by his friend Lenny Santiago. “I let Lenny gas me. We was drinking at J. Cole’s concert,” he said.
In his first post under the the @jayz handle, he promoted the movie and soundtrack he produced, The Harder They Fall. But just a day later, he deleted the page, which had accumulated 800,000 followers in just a matter of hours.
“It went crazy and it was on TIME magazine the next morning. I was like, this is too much,” Hov recalled.
Prior to that in August 2015, he launched a short-lived Instagram account with the name @Hovsince96. His first post was a tribute to Michael Jackson on what would have been the King of Pop’s 57th birthday.
Despite his own aversion to social media, that doesn’t mean he has a problem with it. “I believe in evolution so whatever form it is, I accept that,” he said.
While he doesn’t maintain an Instagram, JAY-Z does have an official Twitter page under the handle @sc with 3 million followers that he occasionally tweets from.
During his conversation with Hart, JAY-Z also explained why he will never retire from music again and broke down his collaboration process, including how much he charges for features.