In 2024, the brand value of Instagram amounted to 70.4 billion U.S. dollars. A year earlier, the value stood at 47.4 billion dollars, while Instagram was the sixth most valuable media brand worldwide.

In 2021, there were 1.21 billion monthly active users of Meta's Instagram, making up over 28 percent of the world's internet users. By 2025, it has been forecast that there will be 1.44 billion monthly active users of the social media platform, which would account for 31.2 percent of global internet users.

How popular is Instagram?

Instagram, as of January 2022, was the fourth most popular social media platform in the world in terms of user numbers. YouTube and WhatsApp ranked in second and third place, respectively, whilst Facebook remained the most popular, with almost three billion monthly active users worldwide.

India had the largest number of Instagram users as of January 2022, with a total of over 230 million users in the country. The second-largest Instagram audience could be found in the United States, with almost 160 million people subscribing to the photo and video sharing app.

Gen Z and Instagram

As of September 2021, Gen Z users in the United States spent an average of five hours per week on Instagram. Although Instagram ranked third in terms of hours per week spent on the platform, Gen Z users spent considerably more time on TikTok, amounting to a weekly average of over 10 hours being spent on the mobile-first video app.

Most followed accounts on Instagram

As of May 2022, Instagram’s own account had 504.37 million followers. In terms of celebrities, Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo (@chistiano) had over 440.41 million followers on the social network. Moreover, the average media value of an Instagram post by Ronaldo was over 985,000 U.S. dollars.

The most liked post on Instagram as of May 2022 was Photo of an Egg, which was posted in 2019 by the account @world_record_egg. Photo of an Egg has not only exceeded 55 million likes on the platform, but it also has nearly 3.5 million comments, and the account itself has over 4.5 million Instagram followers. After mysterious posts published by the account, World Record Egg revealed itself as part of a mental health campaign aimed at the difficulties and demands of using social media.

In the first half of 2023, the media impact value (MIV) of fashion brands on Instagram stood at 8.7 billion U.S. dollars. This was the highest value among the fashion, lifestyle, and beauty (FLB) subsectors presented. Beauty followed with 3.8 billion U.S. dollars in MIV.

As of January 2024, India had a total of 362 million Instagram users, the largest Instagram audience in the world. The United States had 169 million users, and Brazil had 134 million. Indonesia, Turkey, and Japan ranked in fourth, fifth and sixth position, respectively. Brunei is the leading country for Instagram audience reach, with 92 percent of the population using the social media service. Guam came in second, with a penetration rate of 79.2 percent and the Cayman Islands ranked third, with 78.8 percent, followed closely by Kazakhstan, Iceland and Montenegro. It took Instagram 11.2 years to reach the milestone of 2 billion monthly active users worldwide. WhatsApp, also owned by Meta, took 11 years, whilst Facebook took 13.3 years and YouTube took just over 14 years. Instagram’s demographics in the United States As of May 2021, Instagram was the fourth most visited social media service in the United States, after Facebook, Pinterest and Twitter. Out of TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat, TikTok was the most used of all three platforms by Generation Z. Overall, 57 percent of Gen Z social media users used Instagram, down from 61 percent in 2020 and 64 percent in 2019. Instagram finds most popularity with those in the 25 to 34 year age group, and as of December 2021, roughly a third of all users in the United States belonged to this age group. The social media app was also more likely to be used by women. Most followed accounts on Instagram Instagram’s official account had the most followers as of February 2022 with over 470 million followers. Manchester United forward Cristiano Ronaldo (@cristiano) had over 401 million followers on the platform and media personality and makeup mogul Kylie Jenner (@kyliejenner) had over 309 million followers. National Geographic (@natgeo) had over 206.9 million followers, sharing educational content through its renowned photojournalism.

As of April 2024, almost 32 percent of global Instagram audiences were aged between 18 and 24 years, and 30.6 percent of users were aged between 25 and 34 years. Overall, 16 percent of users belonged to the 35 to 44 year age group. Instagram users With roughly one billion monthly active users, Instagram belongs to the most popular social networks worldwide. The social photo sharing app is especially popular in India and in the United States, which have respectively 362.9 million and 169.7 million Instagram users each. Instagram features One of the most popular features of Instagram is Stories. Users can post photos and videos to their Stories stream and the content is live for others to view for 24 hours before it disappears. In January 2019, the company reported that there were 500 million daily active Instagram Stories users. Instagram Stories directly competes with Snapchat, another photo sharing app that initially became famous due to it’s “vanishing photos” feature. As of the second quarter of 2021, Snapchat had 293 million daily active users.

The global influencer marketing market size has more than tripled since 2020. In 2025, the market was estimated to reach a record of approximately 33 billion U.S. dollars. What is influencer marketing? Influencer marketing is a form of social media marketing that involves product placements and endorsements from online creators. In today’s competitive marketing landscape, brands are collaborating with influencers more firmly than ever, as partnerships with well-known creators can open the door to large potential audiences. In 2024, influencer marketing spending in the United States was forecast to reach an all-time high of 7.1 billion U.S. dollars. Seeing that internet stars can boost brand visibility, drive engagement, and impact purchasing decisions for millions of users, it comes as no surprise that spending on influencer cooperation is expected to pick up even more speed in the future. Top influencer marketing platforms Marketers can choose from an ever-expanding list of social media platforms to bridge the gap between brands and consumers. According to a recent survey, Instagram remains the most popular platform for influencer marketing in the United States, and in 2025, the global Instagram influencer market size was estimated to surpass 22 billion dollars for the first time. Apart from the photo-sharing app, video-based platforms such as TikTok have become popular among brands and marketers. In the first half of 2024, the most successful brands earned over half a billion U.S. dollars in earned media value (EMV) with their TikTok influencer marketing campaigns.

As of December 2019, the highest Instagram media value per post in Italy was recorded for the influencer Chiara Ferragni and amounted to more than 89 thousand euros. According to data released by InfluencerDB, Gianluca Vacchi was ranked second, as one of his Instagram posts had an average value of 70,591 euros. The Italian singer Fedez followed, with a value of almost 44 thousand euros for one post, on average.

In the first half of 2023, the Americas had the highest media impact value (MIV) in the fashion, lifestyle, and beauty sector on Instagram, worth 7.1 billion U.S. dollars. The EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa) region followed, with 6.1 billion in MIV.

In 2022, the affiliate marketing service Impact saw a value of approximately 10,437 U.S. dollars per Instagram follower. Blockchain-based platform BitClout ranked second with a value of approximately 6,866 U.S. dollars per Instagram follower, while content licensing and creators' platforms JellySmack saw a value of approximately 1,378 U.S. dollars per Instagram follower. Video and live streaming platform Caffeine saw a value of approximately 16.18 U.S. dollars.

This statistic presents the average media value per post of the most-followed athletes on Instagram worldwide as of January 2020. According to InfluencerDB, the average media value of an Instagram post by Cristiano Ronaldo was over 985,000 U.S. dollars.

This statistic presents information on the leading brands in Instagram influencer marketing worldwide in 2018, by earned media value. The data shows, that Fashion Nova generated close to 588 million U.S dollars in earned media from Instagram in 2018.

In December 2019, an Instagram post of Samantha Vallejo-Nájera had a value of approximately 2.3 thousand euros. According to the data provided by Influencer DB, the Instagram account specializing in desserts Postres Saludables ranked second, as each of his Instagram posts had a value of over two thousand euros.

As of December 2019, a list with the top ten leading Italian musicians accounts on Instagram was released by InfluencerDB. According to the source, Fedez was the artist whose Instagram posts recorded the highest media value, as each of his posts was worth almost 44 thousand euros. The Italian singer Emma Marrone (real_brown) was ranked second, as one of her Instagram posts had a value of 20,881 euros.

As of December 2019, it was found that one post published by Gianluigi Buffon had a value of 41,879 euros, corresponding to the highest social media value per post among leading Italian athletes accounts on Instagram. According to InfluencerDB Buffon was followed by Andrea Pirlo and Claudio Marchisio, whose posts had an average value of nearly 36 thousand euros and 21 thousand euros, respectively.

In December 2019, an Instagram post of Paula Echevarría had a value of 13.8 thousand euros. According to the data provided by Influencer DB, Aída Doménech ranked second, as each of his Instagram posts had a value of 13 thousand euros.

The net advertising revenue of Instagram Stories worldwide was expected to amount to 11.43 billion U.S. dollars in 2021, marking an increase from the previous year's value of 6.9 billion. Instagram Stories ad revenue was expected to further increase over the following two years, reaching a projected 20.03 billion dollars in 2023.

In December 2019, an Instagram post of Chiara Ferragni had a value of 87,176 euros. According to the data provided by InfluencerDB, marianodivaio (profile of Mariano Di Vaio) ranked second, as each of his Instagram posts had a value of almost 30 thousand euros.

In December 2019, an Instagram post of Sergio Ramos had a value of approximately 176 thousand euros. According to the data provided by Influencer DB, the also footballer Andrés Iniesta ranked second, as each of his Instagram posts had a value of over 140 thousand thousand euros.

In the first half of 2023, Mario Dedivanovic's influencer content was the leading voice on Instagram for the beauty sector in terms of media impact value (MIV), with 19.2 million U.S. dollars. He was followed by Elnaz Golrokh's influencer content, with 17.5 million U.S. dollars in MIV.

This statistic presents the leading Italian food accounts on Instagram ranked by the value of their posts in December 2019. According to the data provided by Influencer DB, antoninochef (profile of Antonino Cannavacciuolo) ranked first, as each of his Instagram posts had a value of almost 11 thousand euros in December 2019.