Ari Kystya Is For The Girls

Ari Kystya is having a banner day. She’s just finished a session with her therapist, where she was proud to report that things in her life are going well. “It was really cool to see my therapist be like, ‘Wow, you have no problems,’” she tells me over Zoom, sitting in a pastel-pink room in her Seattle house, in front of a couch adorned with her extensive collection of Jellycats.

The 24-year-old has been spending the last few months traveling with her boyfriend, rapper Yung Gravy, on his Voluptuous Voyage Tour across the U.S. Being home is a chance for her to catch up on house tasks — she owns the property, plus one more in LA — and attend to the never-ending barrage of content she films for her four Instagrams, three TikToks, and top OnlyFans account. Across platforms, she has a jaw-dropping reach of 13 million. Kystya’s life looks endlessly fun online, full of concerts, PR unboxings, and traveling on private jets. But the reality of being a successful OnlyFans creator — or a “bop” or “mattress actress,” as she cheekily calls it — involves a lot of logistics.

“I wake up at 7 a.m. every day, and the first thing that I do is a ‘Get Ready With Me’ video. I try to post all of my videos before 11 a.m., and the rest of my day is spent thinking of video ideas and being stressed out,” she says. Kystya has her busy schedule down to a science after three years of being a full-time creator across multiple platforms.

This year, she’s finally cracked the code to building the audience she really wants. “I have more women than men following me now, which is crazy because I used to have a 90% male following,” she says. “I’m doing more girly vibes videos, which is really fun because I like making them.” Scrolling through Kystya’s TikTok is both entertaining and educational — you’ll go from an enviable designer shopping haul to a clip of her speaking to a university class, then to a GRWM chatting about the movie she’s filming next.

She grew up with her parents and three sisters in Seattle, going to Catholic church every Sunday, which Kystya frequently jokes is a far cry from what she’s doing now. “There were things I learned from church that were good, and a lot that was like, ‘That's not really aligning with how I want to live my life,’” she says. “I learned over the years that I'm not going to rot in hell if I have sex.”

After a quick foray into studying music in college (then dropping out thanks to the pandemic), Kystya went to cosmetology school and moved to LA to work as a makeup artist. She was drawn to OnlyFans after seeing other women in the industry posting on social media. She liked hearing about their experiences and how their job connected to their sexuality. “I was like, ‘This is really stuff that I resonate with,’” she recalls. “I've always been so intrigued by it, and the people in the industry have always seemed awesome.”

People think all I do is take a video or picture of myself naked and just make money. I would love for that to be all that I do because that's my favorite part.

In her early days of building an OF subscriber base, Kystya learned that posting on social media could help funnel people to her paid page. She built her initial TikTok following by posting thirst traps and makeup transition videos, and she didn’t know yet how to do it all herself. “I started with a manager who scammed me — changed the passwords to my account, logged me out, tricked me into signing a contract, and stole $11,000,” Kystya says. She cut ties and started managing herself, something she’d recommend to any woman starting out. “I speak very strongly about this, but I would never trust any of the men that run any of the management companies. I would never recommend any girl to ever work with any of them.”

Today, Kystya’s earnings have grown exponentially — so much so that she has 10 people working for her on things like taxes and business logistics. “People think all I do is take a video or picture of myself naked and just make money. I would love for that to be all that I do because that's my favorite part,” Kystya says. She often messages subscribers until 1 a.m., and she’s constantly brainstorming new concepts to post for them. “You can't just do the same thing every time. When someone sees your boobs, they're like, ‘OK, I've already seen them. What are you going to do with them now?’”

She talks openly on TikTok about her career in sex work in an effort to normalize the industry and be honest about its pitfalls — even if she has to use algospeak to avoid being censored by the platform. "There are a lot of hard things in this job, but it's so subjective to every person,” she says. “Some people's families wouldn't accept them doing this. I’m very successful, which I'm so grateful for, but a lot of people aren't. I've also talked a lot about how people perceive you.”

The one thing Kystya will never share is her income, despite curiosity from her followers about it. “I don't want anyone to look at me and think that they're going to make the same amount,” she says. “I have two houses, I have four cars. I think that's telling.” She’s critical of others in the industry who flaunt their paychecks without providing the full context. “Girls with really big followings will post, ‘Oh, I have a private jet, and I made $20 million.’ It's misleading because they’ll say they make sex tapes, but often they actually don't.”

Stigma is rampant, as evidenced by the dearth of branded opportunities Kystya has had compared to other creators with a quarter of her reach. In August, she filmed a video with Urban Decay, which drew tons of opinions in the comments — both complimentary and critical. “They were the first big company that wanted to work with me,” she says. “I thought it was a really cool message that I can do things other than being a sex worker, and that other people in the industry can also do other things.” She has a word for the people up in arms about it: “A lot of makeup was made for sex workers in the first place.”

I am not meant to be anybody’s daughter's role model, but I will try to educate as much as I can.

One person who’s always in her corner is her boyfriend, who Kystya calls “the most amazing person I’ve ever met.” The two first connected in 2020, when she slid into his DMs, and they became friends with benefits. They both got into other relationships and lost touch, then when Kystya’s following started exploding, Yung Gravy reached back out. “He had messaged me to say, ‘Congrats. You're doing super well. I'm really proud of you,’” she says. After I broke up with my ex, I remembered that he DM'd me, and I wanted to respond because it really was a nice message.” They met up at Coachella in April, Kystya missed her flight home, and the rest is history. “Since that, we've been together basically every single day.”

Dating someone successful in his own right has been a welcome change for Kystya, who’s felt pressure to be the provider in past relationships. “We know if anything happened, one of us would be good to help each other out,” she says. “It takes away any concerns about somebody being with you because of followers or money.” He’s fiercely supportive of her career, and they’ll help each other out with business ideas, but don’t get it twisted — her success is all her own. “He has never taken any money from me or touched my business. My business is mine, and his is his, and we can support each other, but we each do our work, and we keep it.”

Kystya will happily dole out wisdom to anyone interested in what she does — she receives frequent DMs from young women hoping to make it in the industry. “I've had girls ask if they can pay me for advice, and I will never, ever give advice for money. I had to figure stuff out by myself, and why would I ever charge to help somebody navigate something?”

She’s hoping her next online venture is YouTube, but she doesn’t really set specific goals. “Everything that I've done in the past three years has been going with the flow and seeing what happens, and it's worked out well for me,” she says. “As long as I'm putting enough energy in every day, I know I'm going to get it back.

While she didn’t get into this industry to be a spokesperson, it's a part of her job she’s learned to love and embrace. "I am not meant to be anybody’s daughter's role model, but I will try to educate as much as I can,” Kystya says.

If she’s not your cup of tea, no biggie — she’ll ride the hate comments all the way to the bank. Take it from one of her TikTok videos (which has 2.3 million views, by the way): “God forbid a woman loves herself so much she wants to share with the world.”