The internet obsession with teen stars turning 18 isn’t something new. I remember in the early 2000s, there were countdowns to when actresses like the Olsen twins, Lindsay Lohan, and Hilary Duff would turn 18, making them legal adults. It was gross and weird, and it highlighted just how men feel about young women and their sex appeal. Sadly, things have not changed all that much.
Piper Rockelle, who became famous as a child on YouTube before her world was rocked by members of her “squad” accusing her mom of abuse and suing her for millions, turned 18 in 2025. Then, on January 1, 2026, after months of speculation, she launched an OnlyFans account, reportedly as a way to take back her autonomy.
According to reports, the teen allegedly earned $1 million in her first hour on OnlyFans and $3 million in her first 24 hours.
Rockelle also spoke with TMZ back in January 2026 about her decision to join OnlyFans. Despite what people may believe, she didn’t immediately join the site when she turned 18 back in August 2025. She gave careful thought to the decision, making sure it was what worked best for her. A big part of her decision boiled down to “freedom.”
“I feel like for a very long time of my teenage years, I was constantly getting told that I wasn’t acting my age,” she told the outlet.
She reiterated the same sentiment when speaking to USA Today. “If people are going to write my narrative and say that I’ve been exploited my whole entire life, go ahead, I’m exploiting myself,” she continued. “I enjoy doing what I’m doing, I really don’t care what people have to say.”
The last few years have been difficult, Rockelle admitted. Her YouTube channel was demonetized after 11 members of her former influencer group sued her mom, Tiffany Smith, over claims of emotional, sexual, and physical abuse in 2022. That lawsuit ended in a $1.85 million settlement in 2024, NBC News reported.
YouTube was her main source of income at the time, she explained. “I was working with my best friends at the time, like literal best friends, like, I consider them family,” Rockelle said. “It was really hard. The only time when I realized that I was making money is when I lost it all.”
Several of those friends were the subject of the 2025 Netflix documentary, Bad Influence: The Dark Side of Kidfluencing, in which they and their parents publicly detailed the abuse and harassment they allegedly suffered at Smith’s hands. Most notably, many of them detailed various scenarios in which Smith tried to sexualize them for the purposes of creating content, despite them being as young as 8 at the time. There were even accounts of her encouraging some of the children to perform sexual acts on adults in their production circle.
All of the public scrutiny about her life took its toll, leading to an eating disorder between the ages of 15 and 17. “I had so much being taken away from me; I had so much stress,” Rockelle said, per USA Today.
But still, she believes joining OnlyFans was a decision she had to make for herself. And she’s aware there are eyes on her. Still, she doesn’t have a desire to be a role model.
“That was a huge thought for me,” Rockelle said. “Once I did decide to do this, I was like, a lot of girls are going to be disappointed, and a lot of girls are possibly going to want to follow this life path that I’m doing.”
For now, Rockelle just wants to create her own story, without other people’s input. “You don’t have to tell me what I’m doing, because I know,” she told USA Today. “I don’t like when people write my own story.”
