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.

Instagram ranked as the most-used influencer marketing platform used among marketers in the United States in 2021. Nearly 68 percent of marketers adopted Instagram for influencer campaigns. Facebook followed, being used by 52 percent of marketers as an influencer marketing platform, while TikTok came in third with 42 percent. TikTok surpassed YouTube as an influencer marketing platform in 2021 and was expected to rise further over the years - going from 36 percent of marketers using it in 2020 to 54.9 percent in 2025.

During a survey conducted among marketers in the United States and released in July 2023, 58.2 percent of respondents said they were planning to use Instagram Reels for influencer marketing purposes in 2024, while 54 percent said they planned to use TikTok.

In the second quarter of 2019, the fast fashion retail company Fashion Nova spent 5.5 million U.S. dollars on influencer marketing on Instagram, while the French vodka brand Ciroc ranked second, with expenditures on influencer marketing amounting to nearly 3.48 million dollars in the same period.

The annual expenditure of businesses on Instagram influencer marketing in Japan was projected to amount to 26 billion Japanese yen in 2024. It was expected that the market would grow further in the coming years and reach a value of 57 billion yen by 2029.

During a global 2025 survey among marketers and industry leaders, 14.4 percent of respondents stated they invested 10 to 15 percent of their marketing budget into influencer marketing. Nearly 12 percent of respondents devoted more than 50 percent to this type of digital marketing activity. The state of influencer marketing As social platform users continue to rise in recent years, influencer marketing has become an essential format of digital campaigns. Marketers have used this channel to increase brand awareness. Influencer marketing's value worldwide was estimated at over 24 billion U.S. dollars in 2024, compared to nearly 10 billion in 2020. Furthermore, the global influencer marketing platform market size amounted to 15.2 billion dollars in 2022 and was projected to surpass 22 billion dollars in 2025. The epicenter of influencer marketing: Instagram In the spring of 2024, Instagram ranked third among the biggest social media platforms, with roughly two billion monthly active users. With such an impressive user base, the Meta-owned social network proves to be the perfect spot for creators and marketers alike.

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 the first half of 2024, nano-influencers (with between one thousand and 10 thousand followers) on Instagram in Sweden had an average engagement rate of 3.41 percent. Creators with the largest following of over one million had rates of 1.4. The regional average was just below that of nono-influencers, with 3.16 percent.

Italian influencers collaborating with brands on Instagram generated 15.5 million interactions in September 2024, marking a 93.75 percent increase from August's value of 8 million.

In 2021, approximately four billion U.S. dollars were spent on influencer marketing in the United States. This figure would mark a projected increase of around one more billion, just one year later, in 2022. Further growth is anticipated for the future.

Benefits of influencer marketing Influencer marketing has become one of the most popular and effective forms of social media marketing. By partnering up with well-known internet personalities, brands can leverage their massive audience reach and promote products and services to a wealth of potential customers. Apart from increasing visibility and driving engagement, influencer cooperation can also boost revenues for companies of all sizes, as recommendations from social media stars have come to impact shopping behavior for millions of online users worldwide. In line with overall spending growth on this channel, the global market size of influencer marketing platforms is also growing by double digits.

What is the most popular platform for influencer marketing? Influencers bridge the gap between brands and consumers in terms of engagement and interaction, but which platform is best suited for collaboration? According to a recent survey, Instagram remains the most popular platform for influencer marketing worldwide. Content creators have long embraced the app for its various photo- and video-sharing features. Seeing that the platform now also has an inherent shopping tab, it comes as no surprise that marketers are planning to increase influencer endorsement on Instagram in the future. Video-based platforms such as TikTok are also becoming increasingly relevant because of their massive reach, particularly among Gen Z internet users.

In the first quarter of 2018, the marketing spending for influencer marketing on Instagram in the United States and Canada stood at 163 million U.S. dollars. This figure increased to 265 million U.S. dollars a year later in the first quarter of 2019. It was the highest in the second quarter of 2019 at 314 million dollars.

In the first half of 2024, nano-influencers (with between one thousand and 10 thousand followers) on Instagram in Denmark had an average engagement rate of 2.75 percent. Creators with the largest following of over one million had rates of 1.37. The regional average was just below that of nono-influencers, with 2.67 percent.

During a survey among brands working with influencer marketing in Brazil released in December 2024, approximately 85.4 percent reported using Instagram for that purpose. Facebook and YouTube followed, mentioned by 42.5 and 35.3 percent of respondents, respectively. According to the same study, almost 65 percent of agencies in Brazil recommended that their clients spend more on influencer marketing throughout the following year.

During a summer 2024 survey, approximately 89 percent of responding decision makers in Europe reported regularly using Instagram for influencer marketing, followed by TikTok with 64 percent. In comparison, 12 percent stated they would use Twitch or Pinterest.

In the first half of 2024, nano-influencers (with between one thousand and 10 thousand followers) on Instagram in Norway had an average engagement rate of 3.57 percent. Creators with the largest following of over one million had rates of 1.19. The regional average was just below that of nono-influencers, with 3.31 percent.

During a study of engagement rates on Instagram influencer accounts in Mexico, it was found that influencers with a profile size of between one and five thousand followers were projected to have the highest engagement rate in 2021, at 4.66 percent. Micro-influencers with a profile size of between five and 20 thousand followers followed with an engagement rate of 2.13 percent.

The annual expenditure of businesses on influencer marketing in Japan was projected to amount to 86 billion Japanese yen in 2024. It was expected that the market would grow further and reach a value of more than 164 billion yen by 2029. Advertising and social media in Japan Japan is home to a large advertising market, which is considered to be one of the most creative worldwide. In recent years, online advertising has become more and more important, while many traditional media increasingly struggle to generate advertising revenues. This shift from traditional to digital media was accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led people to spend more time inside their own homes and increased the demand for digital entertainment. Social media plays an increasingly important role for advertising not only because social media platforms offer an opportunity to connect with other people, but also because they are frequently used to look up information. Among social advertising expenditures, regular social networking services as well as video sharing platforms constitute the largest ad categories. Social media marketing Unlike advertising, which refers to the process of making a product or service known to potential customers, marketing usually involves further aspects that are directly related to the dissemination of advertisements, such as the research and analysis necessary for the design and creation of ads. Influencer marketing is part of the larger social media marketing market, which is expected to exhibit strong growth in the coming years. As a breakdown of this market shows, it consists of social media advertising, influencer marketing, support for the operation of social media accounts, expenses for analytics tools, as well as campaign planning and consulting. While analytics tools and campaign planning and consulting make up comparatively small shares of the market, they are indispensable aspects with regard to choosing the right platform and advertising strategy. Within the Japanese influencer market, YouTube, Instagram, X (previously known as Twitter), and Tiktok represent the major segments.

According to a survey on influencer marketing in 2024, Instagram was the most preferred platform for influencer marketing in India. YouTube followed by a wide margin. Both these platforms offered wider reach and higher engagement rates. Comparatively, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Snapchat were less preferred.

In 2023, almost eight out of 10 Instagram influencers in Brazil had between one thousand and 10 thousand followers on that social media platform, thus being considered nano-influencers. Macro-influencers (with between half a million and one million followers) and mega-influencers or celebrities (with over a million followers) accounted each for around 0.2 percent of the total. The distribution of Instagram influencers in Latin America by following size was similar.

The average minimum price per post of Instagram mega-influencers with more than one million followers worldwide was 1,210 U.S. dollars in 2023. The average minimum price per post of macro-influencers with 500,000 to one million followers was 370 U.S. dollars, while the average maximum price was 5,000 U.S. dollars.