For years, people have been told that hashtags are essential for increasing reach and visibility on LinkedIn.

So I decided to test it for myself.

Over four weeks, I ran a simple split test.

For the first two weeks, I continued posting with hashtags.

For the next two weeks, I removed hashtags completely from every post.

The results were surprising.

Overall engagement increased by 12%.

Comments increased by nearly 11%.

But the biggest jump came from one of LinkedIn's most important engagement signals: saves.

My saves doubled.

Based on this test, removing hashtags actually improved the performance of my content and encouraged more meaningful engagement from my audience.

As LinkedIn's AI continues to focus more on semantic meaning, expertise, relevance, and audience behavior, hashtags appear to be playing a much smaller role than they once did.

In this episode, I break down exactly what I tested, the results I found, why I believe this is happening, and whether it might be time for you to stop using hashtags as well.

Try it for yourself, run your own test, and let me know what results you find.

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