Photo of Katy Perry at the Met Gala goes viral on social media

An image of Katy Perry all glammed up seemingly attending the Met Gala has gone viral after being viewed more than nine million times.

A photo of Katy Perry all glammed up seemingly attending today’s Met Gala has gone viral after being viewed more than nine million times – and counting – and on Twitter.

The only problem is, the photo is a fake.

The image depicts the US singer standing on the famous steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, where the fashion gala is held every year. She is wearing an ivory gown embroidered with flowers and moss, appearing to nails this year’s theme, Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion.

“Katy Perry. That’s it. #MetGala,” read the caption on the viral image.

Katy Perry appeared to be at the Met Gala, thanks to this AI-generated image of the star. Picture: Twitter

However, as it turns out, the photo circulating online is an AI-generated image of Perry.

Not only was the singer not in attendance, but the background of the photo does not even match this year’s red carpet. In fact, the backdrop is actually from the 2018 Met Gala.

Still, the image was so good, it fooled many Twitter users.

“Not me falling for this AI edit at first,” one person wrote, while another commented, “Wait. It’s AI-generated?! I got fooled.”

“100k and climbing? Oh robots are going to eat us alive,” another user commented as the views on the image increased by the second.

Soon after, another photo of Perry taken supposedly at the Met Gala began doing the rounds on Twitter.

Another AI-generated photo if the singer also went viral on Twitter. Picture: Twitter

“Katy Perry looks absolutely gorgeous on #MetGala 2024,” read the caption on this image, which once again fooled users and racked up close to three million views, despite showing odd flaws on her thumbs and eyes.

Both fake images have since caught the attention of Perry, who gave it her stamp of approval by “liking” the photos from her verified Twitter account.

Over on Instagram, the singer also joked about why she couldn’t attend the event, therefore the AI stand-in was sent in her place.

“Couldn’t make it to the MET, had to work,” she playfully wrote as she reposted the fake images.

And apparently, her mum was fooled too.

Even Perry’s mum was fooled by the likeness.

In her post, Perry shared a screenshot of a message her mum had sent her, in which her mum praised the star’s choice of dress.

“Ha Feather! Didn’t know you went to the Met. What a gorgeous gown, you look like a Rose Parade, you are your own float lol,” her mum texted.

Perry wasted no time filling her in, replying, “lol mom the AI got to you too, BEWARE.”

Fans were also fooled by this photoshopped photo of Selena Gomez from last year’s Met Gala …

… but really it was an image of actress Lily James at the event. Picture: Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images

A similar thing happened last year at the Met Gala when a fake photo of Selena Gomez at the Met Gala went viral.

The photo showed Gomez wearing a sheer one-shoulder dress with blue pearls, but she didn’t attend the event last year.

The Twitter post of the doctored photo gained 25 million views, 37,000 retweets and 390,000 likes – and it became the most-liked photo on Twitter at the time.

However, it was soon discovered that Gomez’s face was photoshopped on actress Lily James’ 2022 Met Gala look by Versace, with the outfit edited to a different shade of blue.

Originally published as Photo of Katy Perry at the Met Gala goes viral on social media