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.

According to a study conducted between 2023 and 2024, Instagram posts from accounts with between 10,001 and 50,000 followers reached an average of 2,909 Instagram users. Overall, stories reached 642 Instagram users, and reels reached 9,649 users.

How many people use Instagram?

Instagram is a social media app which focuses on photo and video sharing. It is owned by Facebook, which recently rebranded as Meta, in a move towards the metaverse. As of December 2021, Instagram reached a new milestone of 2 billion active users worldwide. The platform previously reached 1 billion users in June 2018.

Users aged 25 to 34 years made up the biggest Instagram user group by age worldwide, followed by 18 to 24 year olds. Overall, men accounted for 51.6 percent of global Instagram users.

Most popular Instagram accounts and content

Footballer Cristiano Ronaldo was the most followed person on Instagram as of 2021, with approximately 315 million followers. Ranked in second and third position were the Rock and Ariana Grande, both having over 250 million followers each.

It’s not only athletes and actors who drive the views on Instagram though. Instagram has long since become a medium for people and communities to spread their messages, and in the past two years, social activists and educators have used Instagram for their movements. Political and educational accounts generate high engagement rates with their content. Posts from political accounts receive an average engagement rate of 2.74 percent and educational posts receive an average of 2.56 percent.

Social media usage worldwide

There are 3.4 billion social media users worldwide and this is expected to increase to 4.41 billion by 2025. Instagram is most popular in India with a total of 201.1 million users, followed by the U.S. with 157.1 million and Brazil with 114.9 million active users. Instagram is the fourth most popular social media site in the world, after Facebook, YouTube and WhatsApp, respectively.

As of October 2021, Brunei was the country with the highest Instagram audience reach with 92 percent of the population using the platform. This was followed by Guam with 79.2 percent and the Cayman Islands with 78.8 percent audience reach.

As of October 2021, Facebook had almost 3 billion users worldwide. The penetration rate for Facebook in the United States in 2021 was 70.59 percent and it is expected to reach 76.87 percent by 2026.

In 2024, the average Instagram post from an account with under 500 followers reached around 6,500 Instagram users, up from 1,405 in 2023. Huge accounts, with over 50,001 followers reach an average of 49,932 thousand users in 2024, down from 56,191 users in 2023.

As of March 2024, Instagram posts from accounts with between 2,001 to 10,000 followers reached an average of 742.81 users. Overall, medium accounts' stories reached 244.77 users, while reels reached 3,248 Instagram users.

In 2024, Instagram Reels reached the most users on Instagram, with brand content published in this format accounting for 37.87 percent of reach. Carousels made up just over a quarter of all reach on the platform, and images accounted for 17.21 percent.

Introduction

Instagram Statistics: Instagram has been a major part of social media culture since 2010 and now has over 2 billion monthly active users globally, ranking it among the top five platforms in the world. Instagram’s short-form video format, Reels, hit a massive milestone of over 150 billion daily viewers coming late 2024, which is reflective of the staggering user engagement growth within the platform.

By January 2025, 5.24 billion of the world’s population, almost 64%, were using social media in some way, with Instagram a major player in that space. Unique to Instagram is the combination of visual storytelling, hashtags, discoverability features, and in-app commerce that keeps users engaged for a staggering average of almost 2 hours daily.

Instagram has shifted from a photo-sharing app to an entertainment and shopping center, all with an audience of 1.8 billion Reels users. If brands and audiences are your thing, Instagram is still a top-tier platform, a canvas and a window for a dynamic, immersive experience with limitless marketing potential.

How many active users are on Instagram? In 2023, the photo sharing site is projected to reach ***** million monthly active users in the United States, up from ***** million users in 2020. Social network reach The internet has brought about many changes in how people around the world communicate, especially through one of its most powerful inventions: social media. According to a recent study, internet users worldwide spend an average of over *********** per day on one of the many social media platforms. Such websites and apps are increasingly used not just for social sharing, but also as means to building reputation, finding career opportunities or monetary income. As of January 2021, an estimated ** percent of the world’s population was using social networking, with West and Northern Europe having the highest penetration rate – ** percent of the respective region's populations. Eastern Asia placed first in a global ranking of mobile social media penetration according to geographical region. Industry leaders Facebook is by far the most popular social network with over *** billion global monthly active users but Instagram, the mobile photo and video-sharing application launched in 2010, is quickly growing in popularity. Instagram was bought by Facebook back in 2012. As of June 2018, there are an estimated *********** Instagram monthly active users worldwide. There are an estimated *********** Instagram users in the United States alone, a number which is forecast to grow to over *** million in 2023. According to the company, the secret to their success is their unique visual storytelling approach to social media. Users registered with the platform can upload pictures and videos, to which they can also apply filters, frames and other effects. They can also attach captions, tags of other people/accounts, whether friends, celebrities or companies and hashtags, which make the media easy to find if one is looking for specific subjects. There are a reported ** million photos uploaded to Instagram every day.

Introduction

Instagram Users statistics: Instagram has become a worldwide beast with 2 billion monthly active users (MAUs) and is the 3rd largest social network behind Facebook and YouTube. This massive user population represents around 35.9% of the 5.56 billion internet users around the world, and an incredible 34.6% of worldwide mobile users are connecting on Instagram each month.

The largest user population in India with 392.5 million, followed by the US with 172.6 million, Brazil with 141.4 million, and Indonesia with 90.2 million users. Users spend an average of almost 34 minutes each day using the platform, and this signals Instagram’s connection for deep engagement.

To better leverage, Instagram’s audience has almost equal gender representation and largely made up of Gen Z and Millennials; thus, Instagram is still a relevant channel for companies who want to access these digitally native audiences.

During the fourth quarter of 2023, Meta stated that 3.98 billion people were using at least one of the company's core products (Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, or Messenger) each month. This was a slight increase of monthly active users (MAU) when compared to the previous quarter. Daily active users (DAU) of Meta's core products also saw year-over-year increases.

Snapchat now boasts over 319 million daily active users. That means it’s one of the most engaging platforms. Snapchat currently has a total user base of 800 million.

Instagram stands as one of the most influential social platforms. Globally, it now reaches about 2 billion monthly active users, showing a remarkable uptick from previous years. Both content creators, from micro-influencers to brands, and advertisers benefit from this scale: creators monetize Reels and Stories, while businesses tap into finely segmented...

As of July 2025, the Dominican Republic was the Caribbean territory with the largest Instagram audience, counting over *** million monthly active users (MAU). In second place was Puerto Rico, with approximately **** million users. When looking at Latin America as a whole, Brazil was the country with the highest number of users of the photo and video sharing social media platform.

Introduction

Social Media User Statistics: As of January 2025, it is projected that approximately 5.24 billion individuals globally are engaged on social media platforms, which accounts for 63.9% of the total world population. This indicates an annual increase of 206 million users, connecting to a growth rate of 4.1%. On average, users engage with 6.8 different social platforms each month and spend roughly 2 hours and 21 minutes per day on these platforms.

Mobile devices account for 98% of the time allocated to social media, highlighting the dominance of mobile access. Facebook continues to lead with over 3 billion monthly active users, followed by YouTube with around 2.5 billion users. Instagram and WhatsApp each boast approximately 2 billion users, while TikTok has surpassed 1.5 billion users.

Introduction

Instagram Marketing Statistics: Instagram’s marketing dominance can no longer be dismissed. With a jaw dropping 2 billion monthly active users, and with 500 million people engaging with stories daily, while 61% look at Instagram to discover new products, business are spreading real ad dollars now, over 1 million businesses are running ads on Instagram and ad spend is expected to grow to $276.7 billion on social platforms in just 2 years.

The shift to short-form content is strong. Reels are now responsible for 45% of the time spent engaging with content on Instagram, and video posts platform's better than static images by 49%. With 90% of users following at least one business, and 70% of users engaging with Instagram stories daily, Instagram will continue to play a central role in consumer connection.

As video content and shopping functionality drive deeper and broader engagement, marketers who lean into Reels, shoppable posts, and authenticity can see real ROI and audience growth.

The number of Instagram users in Central & Western Europe was forecast to increase between 2024 and 2028 by in total 4.5 million users (+3.52 percent). This overall increase does not happen continuously, notably not in 2028. The Instagram user base is estimated to amount to 132.21 million users in 2028. Notably, the number of Instagram users of was continuously increasing over the past years.User figures, shown here with regards to the platform instagram, have been estimated by taking into account company filings or press material, secondary research, app downloads and traffic data. They refer to the average monthly active users over the period and count multiple accounts by persons only once.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).Find more key insights for the number of Instagram users in countries like Eastern Europe and Northern Europe.

Users spend an average of 19.6 hours per month on TikTok alone. This works out to be approximately 39 minutes per day.

In 2024, Carousels on Instagram generated more engagement from users than single images, Reels, and Reels from the feed. Overall, the engagement rate of Carousels stood at 10.15 percent in 2024, compared to 7.36 percent for images.

The number of Instagram users in Indonesia was forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2028 by in total 5.3 million users (+4.25 percent). After the ninth consecutive increasing year, the Instagram user base is estimated to reach 129.83 million users and therefore a new peak in 2028. Notably, the number of Instagram users of was continuously increasing over the past years.User figures, shown here with regards to the platform instagram, have been estimated by taking into account company filings or press material, secondary research, app downloads and traffic data. They refer to the average monthly active users over the period and count multiple accounts by persons only once.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).Find more key insights for the number of Instagram users in countries like Philippines and Thailand.

The number of Instagram users in the United Kingdom was forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2028 by in total 2.1 million users (+7.02 percent). After the ninth consecutive increasing year, the Instagram user base is estimated to reach 32 million users and therefore a new peak in 2028. Notably, the number of Instagram users of was continuously increasing over the past years.User figures, shown here with regards to the platform instagram, have been estimated by taking into account company filings or press material, secondary research, app downloads and traffic data. They refer to the average monthly active users over the period and count multiple accounts by persons only once.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).