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How Much the Most Followed Instagram Accounts Earn on Posts

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A graphic showing the most followed instagram accounts and their earnings per sponsored post.

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.

NameCategoryFollowersEarnings Per Post
Cristiano RonaldoSport442,267,575$2,397,000
Kylie JennerCelebrity338,626,294$1,835,000
Lionel MessiSport327,954,875$1,777,000
Selena GomezCelebrity320,082,515$1,735,000
Dwayne ‘The Rock’ JohnsonCelebrity315,999,932$1,713,000
Kim KardashianCelebrity311,685,198$1,689,000
Ariana GrandeCelebrity311,302,908$1,687,000
Beyoncé Knowles-CarterCelebrity256,957,282$1,393,000
Khloé KardashianCelebrity243,609,638$1,320,000
Kendall JennerCelebrity237,977,121$1,290,000
Justin BieberCelebrity236,391,845$1,281,000
Taylor SwiftCelebrity210,659,702$1,142,000
Jennifer LopezCelebrity208,469,193$1,130,000
Virat KohliSport200,703,169$1,088,000
Nicki MinajCelebrity190,264,361$1,031,000
Kourtney KardashianCelebrity177,874,659$964,000
Neymar da Silva Santos JuniorSport174,248,989$945,000
Miley CyrusCelebrity171,147,090$928,000
Katy PerryCelebrity163,620,880$1,029,000
Kevin HartCelebrity143,895,754$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.

RankNameEarnings per Follower
1Katy Perry$0.0062889
2Neymar da Silva Santos Junior$0.0054233
3Miley Cyrus$0.0054222
4Beyoncé Knowles-Carter$0.0054211
5Taylor Swift$0.0054211
6Virat Kohli$0.0054209
7Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson$0.0054209
8Kendall Jenner$0.0054207
9Kevin Hart$0.0054206
10Selena Gomez$0.0054205
11Jennifer Lopez$0.0054205
12Cristiano Ronaldo$0.0054198
13Kourtney Kardashian$0.0054195
14Ariana Grande$0.0054192
15Justin Bieber$0.005419
16Kylie Jenner$0.005419
17Kim Kardashian$0.0054189
18Nicki Minaj$0.0054188
19Khloé Kardashian$0.0054185
20Lionel 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?

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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.

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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?

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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.

RankCategoryConsumer Spending 2023Examples
1Digital Entertainment$8.2BDisney+
2Dating$5.7BTinder
3Short Videos$4.3BTikTok
4Video Sharing$2.4BYouTube
5Comics$2.3BPiccoma
6Music/Podcasts$2.1BSpotify
7File Management$2.0BGoogle One
8Live Sports$1.2BESPN
9Live Streaming$1.2BBIGO LIVE
10Communication$1.1BLINE
11Photo Editing$1.0BPicsart
12Language Learning$0.9BDuolingo
13Business Software$0.9BAdobe Reader
14Fiction$0.9BGoodNovel
15Fitness$0.8BPeloton

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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