Later
What's sold as one product today is really three companies stacked on top of each other — and the name on the box belongs to the smallest of the three.
What is Later?
Cindy Chen, Ian MacKinnon, Roger Patterson, and Matt Smith started Later in Vancouver in 2014 under the name Latergramme, building what's widely credited as the first dedicated Instagram scheduling tool, along with the Linkin.bio feature that has since generated more than two billion pageviews. In April 2022, Boston-based influencer-marketing firm Mavrck acquired Later, funding the deal with a $135 million strategic investment from Summit Partners. Later kept operating as a standalone product at first — but in 2024, Mavrck rebranded the entire combined company under the Later name, meaning the acquirer ultimately gave up its own name for the more recognizable brand it had bought. The current entity, still Vancouver-rooted in spirit but private-equity-backed and headquartered around its Boston operations, has raised more than $276 million to date.
The roll-up kept going: in 2025, Later acquired the social-commerce affiliate app Mavely for $250 million, adding roughly 75 employees and pulling creator-affiliate technology directly into the platform. What that history means for the product today is that "Later" now covers three formerly separate businesses under one login — Later Social (the original scheduler), Later Influence (the former Mavrck influencer platform), and the newly folded-in Mavely commerce layer. On the scheduling side specifically, Later still uses "social sets" rather than counting individual accounts, and it remains one of the more conspicuous holdouts in this category for not offering generative AI caption writing, leaning instead on hashtag and best-time-to-post suggestions.
Corporate history and acquisition figures are drawn from contemporaneous business-press coverage of the 2022 and 2025 deals; feature and pricing details reflect Later's published plans as of 2026.
Key features
Visual content calendar
Drag-and-drop grid planning built specifically around how an Instagram feed will look.
Linkin.bio
Turns a feed into a clickable, shoppable landing page — the feature Later is best known for.
Social Inbox
Unified comments and messages across platforms, from the Growth plan up.
Hashtag suggestions
Rule-based recommendations rather than generative AI, gated to Growth and above.
Influencer & affiliate tools
Creator discovery and commission tracking, inherited from the Mavrck and Mavely acquisitions.
Competitive benchmarking
Compares an account's performance against competitors, on the Scale plan.
Pricing
Starter
- 1 social set — up to 6 accounts, one per platform
- 30 posts per profile per month, roughly 180 total
- No hashtag suggestions or Social Inbox at this tier
Growth
- More social sets and users, Social Inbox, approval workflows
- Hashtag suggestions unlock at this tier
- Up to 180 posts or unlimited, depending on the exact plan snapshot
Scale
- Unlimited posts, competitive benchmarking, custom analytics
- Brand sentiment monitoring and 1–2 years of analytics history
- Built for agencies and larger multi-brand teams
Later prices around "social sets" rather than individual accounts — one set covers up to six platforms for a single brand. A limited Free plan still exists but isn't prominently advertised on the main pricing page; all paid plans include a 14-day free trial and roughly a 25% discount for annual billing.
Three products under one login
Integrations & platforms
Pros, cons & best for
Pros
- Still the most visual, Instagram-native planning grid in the category
- Linkin.bio is a mature, well-tested link-in-bio product with real scale behind it
- Influencer and affiliate tools now built in, rather than needing a separate platform
Cons
- No generative AI caption writing, a notable gap against most 2026 competitors
- Hashtag suggestions and Social Inbox are locked out of the entry Starter plan entirely
- Product now spans three merged companies, which shows in some feature overlap and inconsistency
Best for
- Visually-driven brands and creators who plan around how a feed looks, not just what it says
- Accounts that also want influencer or affiliate tools in the same platform
- Not the pick for anyone who specifically wants AI-drafted captions included
Take a look inside
Alternatives
For built-in AI caption writing, or a simpler per-channel price:
Our verdict
Later's visual planning grid and Linkin.bio remain genuinely strong reasons to pick it over a more text-first competitor, especially for brands and creators whose feed's appearance matters as much as any single caption. The corporate structure underneath is worth understanding before committing, though: what's marketed as one platform is really three acquired businesses stitched together across a decade of deals, and that history shows up as feature inconsistency between the original scheduling tool and the newer influence and commerce layers bolted on. The more immediate gap for 2026 is the missing generative AI writing — Later offers hashtag and timing suggestions, but not the caption-drafting most competitors now bundle in even at entry-level pricing, which is a real trade-off for anyone hoping one subscription covers both planning and writing. Worth it for visually-driven accounts that value the calendar and Linkin.bio specifically. Worth pairing with a separate AI writing tool, or choosing a competitor that includes one, if drafting help is part of what's being paid for.
FAQ
Is Later still a Vancouver company?
Its scheduling product started in Vancouver in 2014, but the current company is the result of a 2022 acquisition by Boston-based Mavrck, which renamed itself Later in 2024 and now operates as a private-equity-backed roll-up.
Does Later have AI caption generation?
Not generative AI writing as of 2026 — it offers hashtag and best-time-to-post suggestions instead, which puts it behind most competitors that now include AI drafting even on lower tiers.
What's a "social set" in Later's pricing?
One social set covers up to six connected accounts, one per supported platform, for a single brand — pricing scales by how many sets are needed, not by individual account count.
What did the Mavely acquisition add?
Mavely, acquired for $250 million in 2025, brought affiliate and social-commerce technology into Later, letting creators earn commissions on sales they drive for brands directly through the platform.
Is there still a free plan?
A limited Free plan technically exists but isn't prominently advertised on Later's current pricing page, which leads with a 14-day trial on paid plans instead.
Who founded the original Later?
Cindy Chen, Ian MacKinnon, Roger Patterson, and Matt Smith founded it in Vancouver in 2014 under the name Latergramme, as one of the first dedicated Instagram scheduling tools.