The creativity literature suggests the important role of social network ties in driving individual creativity. What is unknown is that how does the focal actor can benefit from different alters. Drawing on social capital theory, we suggest that the effects of social capital on individual’s creativity depend not only on the structures of the social network ties (i.e., tie strength and structural holes), but also on the learning attributes of the alters. Drawing on organizational learning theory, we suggest that exploration and exploitation of the alters will bring different knowledge to the focal actor through their social network ties. Based on data from 390 employees in 31 teams, we find being strongly tied with alters who are exploratory can facilitate focal actors’ creativity. However, being weakly tied with alters who are exploratory or being strongly tied with alters who are exploitative impede the focal actor’s creativity. We also examine how structural holes of the focal actor moderate the effects of strongly-tied and weakly-tied alters’ learning on focal actor’s creativity.