Manchester United [former] forward, Cristiano Ronaldo has clocked 500 million followers on Instagram. That is a staggering figure, but should not come as a shock considering his huge popularity around the world.
The 37 years old captain of the Portuguese national team who recently granted a controversial interview with celebrity journalist Pierse Morgan, beats his closest rival in sports, Lionel Messi to take the first position on Instagram.
Comfortably on the number one position is Cristiano Ronaldo with over 500 million followers. That sure comes with a lot of power and influence, and we expect that the most influential sports person on earth will put that to good use.
Talking about “good use,” the 37 years old soccer legend recently launched his own NFT on Binance. This is coming in spite of his off-field trials, and may see him making millions of dollars if all goes to plan.
In January 2021, the five-time Ballon D’or awards winner had 250 million followers on the Facebook-owned app.
Ronaldo’s milestone achievement at the time was almost a 100 million followers ahead of his closest soccer rival Lionel Messi. The Argentine who got the whole world rattled when he announced in 2020 his intention to exit Barcelona, had 174 million followers.
The Portuguese holds the record of being the first human to reach that milestone. Cristiano has broken a lot of records on and off the soccer pitch, and at 35, continues to dominate world and European soccer.
Per Forbes, Ronaldo earns nearly $1 million per paid post on Instagram. He also has the second-highest income from Instagram-related revenue at $23.3 million. In 2020, the former Juventus forward became the first human to hit 200 million followers on Instagram. What that means is that he added some 50 million followers in the previous year.
On Twitter, Ronaldo enjoys a huge followership—the Portuguese captain boasts some 105 million followers His figures on the social media including Facebook are scary, and no wonder is regarded as one of the most influential sports personality on earth.
In 2018, HopperHQ published the list of top celebrity influencers on Instagram—and names of popular sports [soccer] personalities made the cut. Top on the list was Cristiano Ronaldo who switched club from Real Madrid in Spain to Juventus in Italy the same year, and later to Manchester United before announcing his departure yesterday.
