apps
How Much the Most Followed Instagram Accounts Earn on Posts
Most Followed Instagram Accounts and Sponsored Post Costs
Instagram is not only one of the biggest social media platforms, it’s also one of the most profitable for high profile creators.
Despite having fewer users than platforms like Facebook and YouTube, Instagram’s higher engagement rate gives it one of the highest advertising costs. In 2023, average ad prices on Instagram were estimated at $3.56 cost per click, ahead of every platform except LinkedIn.
For the celebrities with the most followers on Instagram, and the brands trying to profit from their followers, that translates into million-dollar costs for some sponsored posts. Pablo Alvarez has visualized Instagram’s biggest accounts, and their estimated earnings per sponsored post, using HopperHQ data from September 2022.
Calculating The Earnings Per Sponsored Post
It’s easy to assume that the most followed Instagram accounts make the most money on sponsored posts, but that appears to be only partially true.
In conducting research for the dataset, HopperHQ utilized both publicly available data and reports and privately researched statistics to measure the impact of different factors:
- Number of followers
- Levels of engagement (legitimate views, likes & comments)
- Influencer’s category (sports, music, acting, etc.)
- Audience makeup
- Influencer status (previous endorsements, number of endorsements, etc.)
And though the number of followers was the biggest influencing factor, some stars earned more from followers than others.
Costs of the Most Followed Instagram Accounts in 2022
The most followed person on Facebook and Instagram, soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo leads the list of the most expensive Instagram accounts in 2022 for sponsored content.
It’s estimated that the former Manchester United and Real Madrid star was able to charge an estimated $2.4 million per sponsored post in 2022. With 442 million followers at the time of calculation, Ronaldo was estimated to charge nearly half a million dollars per post more than the next person on the list.
Name | Category | Followers | Earnings Per Post |
---|---|---|---|
Cristiano Ronaldo | Sport | 442,267,575 | $2,397,000 |
Kylie Jenner | Celebrity | 338,626,294 | $1,835,000 |
Lionel Messi | Sport | 327,954,875 | $1,777,000 |
Selena Gomez | Celebrity | 320,082,515 | $1,735,000 |
Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson | Celebrity | 315,999,932 | $1,713,000 |
Kim Kardashian | Celebrity | 311,685,198 | $1,689,000 |
Ariana Grande | Celebrity | 311,302,908 | $1,687,000 |
Beyoncé Knowles-Carter | Celebrity | 256,957,282 | $1,393,000 |
Khloé Kardashian | Celebrity | 243,609,638 | $1,320,000 |
Kendall Jenner | Celebrity | 237,977,121 | $1,290,000 |
Justin Bieber | Celebrity | 236,391,845 | $1,281,000 |
Taylor Swift | Celebrity | 210,659,702 | $1,142,000 |
Jennifer Lopez | Celebrity | 208,469,193 | $1,130,000 |
Virat Kohli | Sport | 200,703,169 | $1,088,000 |
Nicki Minaj | Celebrity | 190,264,361 | $1,031,000 |
Kourtney Kardashian | Celebrity | 177,874,659 | $964,000 |
Neymar da Silva Santos Junior | Sport | 174,248,989 | $945,000 |
Miley Cyrus | Celebrity | 171,147,090 | $928,000 |
Katy Perry | Celebrity | 163,620,880 | $1,029,000 |
Kevin Hart | Celebrity | 143,895,754 | $780,000 |
Kylie Jenner, the world’s “youngest self-made billionaire” according to Forbes, was second with earnings of $1.8 million per sponsored post on Instagram. Jenner, a member of the Kardashian–Jenner family with five of the top 20 most followed Instagram accounts, is also the youngest person among this cohort of big earners on Instagram.
But the most commonly followed celebrities in the top 20 were musicians with household names, including Ariana Grande, Beyoncé, and Taylor Swift. They accounted for 45% of the most followed accounts.
The Biggest Earners per Follower
Though almost all of the most followed accounts were estimated to cost more than those with lower follower counts, Katy Perry (Rank: 16th) stands out.
Perry was estimated to better utilize Instagram’s reach and earn more in total than #17-19, despite tens of millions fewer followers. In fact, she was calculated to earn more per follower than all of the top 20.
Rank | Name | Earnings per Follower |
---|---|---|
1 | Katy Perry | $0.0062889 |
2 | Neymar da Silva Santos Junior | $0.0054233 |
3 | Miley Cyrus | $0.0054222 |
4 | Beyoncé Knowles-Carter | $0.0054211 |
5 | Taylor Swift | $0.0054211 |
6 | Virat Kohli | $0.0054209 |
7 | Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson | $0.0054209 |
8 | Kendall Jenner | $0.0054207 |
9 | Kevin Hart | $0.0054206 |
10 | Selena Gomez | $0.0054205 |
11 | Jennifer Lopez | $0.0054205 |
12 | Cristiano Ronaldo | $0.0054198 |
13 | Kourtney Kardashian | $0.0054195 |
14 | Ariana Grande | $0.0054192 |
15 | Justin Bieber | $0.005419 |
16 | Kylie Jenner | $0.005419 |
17 | Kim Kardashian | $0.0054189 |
18 | Nicki Minaj | $0.0054188 |
19 | Khloé Kardashian | $0.0054185 |
20 | Lionel Messi | $0.0054184 |
The earnings per follower round up to just under a cent each, but tens of millions of followers make a sizable impact. In addition to Perry, Neymar (Rank: 18th) and Miley Cyrus (Rank: 19th) had the highest earnings-per-follower, ahead of accounts with hundreds of millions more followers.
But a new year can bring a lot of changes. The most followed Instagram accounts have already been reshuffled, with Lionel Messi now the second-most followed and Selena Gomez overtaking Kylie Jenner as the most-followed woman. How will potential earnings be impacted this year?

This article was published as a part of Visual Capitalist's Creator Program, which features data-driven visuals from some of our favorite Creators around the world.
apps
What Types of Apps Do People Actually Pay For?
Nearly all the apps available are free, so which ones are people actually willing to drop a few dollars on?

Ranked: Types of Mobile Apps, by Revenue in 2023
This was originally posted on our Voronoi app. Download the app for free on iOS or Android and discover incredible data-driven charts from a variety of trusted sources.
A lot of the digital sphere is technically free if one has an internet connection. After all, many useful apps—email, messaging, social media—can be accessed for the grand sum of zero dollars and zero cents.
But many people choose to pay for apps anyway, either to get rid of ads, access content locked behind paywalls, or to opt in for a more exclusive form of service.
So what are these apps? And how much money are we talking about?
This chart tracks the amount of money spent on apps by mobile users around the world using data from SensorTower’s State of Mobile 2024 report.
Importantly, it does not include spending on mobile games.
Entertainment, Dating, Are Big Wins
The top category of apps people pay for is Digital Entertainment, earning more than $8 billion in revenue for various providers (Netflix, Disney+, HBO).
And media access is a big theme in the app economy: from live sports and music to comics and books.
Rank | Category | Consumer Spending 2023 | Examples |
---|---|---|---|
1 | Digital Entertainment | $8.2B | Disney+ |
2 | Dating | $5.7B | Tinder |
3 | Short Videos | $4.3B | TikTok |
4 | Video Sharing | $2.4B | YouTube |
5 | Comics | $2.3B | Piccoma |
6 | Music/Podcasts | $2.1B | Spotify |
7 | File Management | $2.0B | Google One |
8 | Live Sports | $1.2B | ESPN |
9 | Live Streaming | $1.2B | BIGO LIVE |
10 | Communication | $1.1B | LINE |
11 | Photo Editing | $1.0B | Picsart |
12 | Language Learning | $0.9B | Duolingo |
13 | Business Software | $0.9B | Adobe Reader |
14 | Fiction | $0.9B | GoodNovel |
15 | Fitness | $0.8B | Peloton |
Aside from that, mobile users around the world are also dropping big bucks on dating apps which pulled in close to $6 billion in revenue in 2024.
In fact, according to SensorTower, Tinder was the first non-game mobile app to reach $1 billion in user spending in 2020. It also remains the only dating app to do so.
By employing the paywall model, dating apps can either restrict access to new profiles, usually by setting a specific number of “likes” or “matches,” or offer to boost a user’s profile, both for a small fee.
Meanwhile, people theorise (currently without evidence) that dating apps cripple prospects for non-paying members, which may lead into a feedback loop towards paying for matches.
As of 2024, about 11% of Tinder’s user base are paying members, accounting for about 60% of its revenue.
With the World Health Organization warning that loneliness could soon become a global public health concern, one imagines dating apps are only going to see revenue gains.
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