37 Instagram Marketing Facts and Stats Every Marketer Should Know in 2023

As the new year starts, marketers and business owners will be looking for new and effective ways to promote their brands on Instagram. But before you roll up your sleeves and get to work, it's a good idea to have a refresher course on the important marketing facts and the statistics every marketer should know as they head into 2023.

We’ve sorted the facts and statistics into sections to make it easy for you to digest the content. 

Let’s dive in.

‍

General Instagram facts and stats

‍#1. Instagram was founded by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger

In October 2010, Instagram was launched by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger. The app rapidly became popular with one million people registering within two months. 

‍

‍

#2. Instagram was acquired for approximately $1 billion

In April 2012, Facebook Inc now called Meta acquired the social media app for US$1 billion in cash and stocks. It's interesting to note that when Facebook acquired Instagram, it wasn’t generating any revenues. But with Instagram having 27 million registered users on iOS alone, Mark Zuckerberg felt that paying a huge premium over Instagram’s last valuation will be worth it in the long run. 

‍

#3. Since Instagram launched, over 50 billion photos have been shared on the platform

According to Omnicore, 1074 pictures are uploaded to Instagram per second. This means that an estimated 64,440 pictures are shared per minute and 4 million per hour. The number of videos and pictures uploaded is estimated at 95 million per day.

‍

#4. Instagram’s explore page is viewed by over 200 million plus daily active accounts

‍50 percent of the accounts on Instagram also use Explore every month. 

‍

#5. The most liked post on Instagram has over 74 million likes and was uploaded on the 18th of December 2022

A carousel post of Argentine footballer Lionel Messi and his teammates celebrating winning the FIFA 2022 World Cup is the most liked post on Instagram. The second most liked post is a photo of an egg. The post has over 58 million likes. 

‍

‍

#6. More than half of the captions and comments on Instagram contain emojis

Instagram is a very visual platform. So along with photos, videos, and graphics, users also share a lot of emojis. And this is no surprise as using at least one emoji in your posts can lead to 15% more average interactions per post 

‍

#7. Currently, the ten most popular Instagram hashtags are:

#love, #instagood, #photooftheday, #fashion, #trending, #explorepage, #viral, #tbt, #like4like, and #followme. The hashtag #love alone has been used in over 2.1 billion posts. 

‍

#8. In 2013, 24 hours after announcing the video feature, 5 million videos were uploaded to the platform

‍

Instagram demographics and usage facts

Instagram is one of the most popular social media networks making it one of the best platforms to promote your brand. But to take full advantage of Instagram, it’s important to understand who uses the platform and how they use it. 

‍

#9. Instagram has over two billion active users

As of Q3 of 2021, Instagram has reached two billion active users. Business of Apps estimates the number of users to reach 2.5 billion by 2023.

‍

#10. Globally, there are more males on Instagram than females 

As of January 2022, 50.7% of Instagram users were male while the female audience made up 49.3 percent. But if you look at the distribution of Instagram users by country, there might be more female users than male users. For example, in France, they are more female users (53.7%) than male users (44.4%).

‍

#11. Instagram was the second most downloaded app globally in 2022

Instagram was downloaded 548 million times in 2022 making it the second most downloaded app. TikTok comes in first with 672 million downloads. 

‍

#12. The majority of Instagram users are aged between 18 and 34

In terms of gender distribution, users between 18 to 24 make up 30.2% of the users. Users between the age of 25 to 44 make up 31.7% of the users. 

‍

#13. Instagram is the third most popular social media platform among teenagers

As of the fall of 2021, Statista reported that 22% of teenagers preferred the photo-sharing app to other social networks. Snapchat takes first place with TikTok coming in as a close second. 

‍

‍

#14. As of January 2022, India had 230.5 million users‍

...making it the country with the most users. The United States comes in second with 159.75 million users and Brazil is in third place with 119.45 users. 

‍

#15. On average, people spend 147 minutes on social media daily

Reports from Broadband Search also show that on average, users spend 29 minutes a day on the platform. 

‍

#16. 62% of Instagram users log into Instagram at least once a day

‍

#17. Over 50% of the accounts on Instagram use the Explore page to discover accounts to follow and new content

‍

#18. The Instagram Like button is clicked on average 4.2 billion times a day

‍

#19. The monthly active users on Instagram are more than the population of North America and the EU at 2 billion

The population of the EU is 743 million and North America has a population of 378 million. 

‍

#20. Despite Instagram’s user guidelines, 5% of kids in the United States under 11 use Instagram

Users are required to be 13 years and above before creating an account. Surprisingly, in 2020, a survey of US adults carried out by Pew Research showed that 14% of the adults in the U.S. had never heard of Instagram. This is why it is important to research and understand your target audience before starting any marketing campaign.

‍

Instagram advertising facts and stats

‍#21. Advertising your products on Instagram Stories can help drive more sales to your business

Instagram reports that 50% of Instagrammers have visited a website to buy a product/service after seeing it in Stories. 

To fully take advantage of advertising on Stories,  it is best practice to add a product tag in the post so viewers can easily visit your website or sales page. Instagram even states in a blog post that using product tags for 5-plus days per month will significantly increase your product page visits and purchases.

‍

#22. The average Instagram CPC in January of 2023 was $1.11

Note that the average cost will vary depending on your brand’s campaign objective and the time of the year. 

‍

‍

Other factors that can cause high Instagram CPC are irrelevant ads, unconvincing offers, boring ad creatives, uncatchy headlines, and bland ad copy. 

‍

#23. The influencer marketing industry is growing strong on Instagram year in and year out

More and more brands are working with influencers on Instagram to promote their brand, products, and services. In fact, a Statista survey found that 93% of the responding marketers and agency professionals in the United States use influencers for social media marketing. 

‍

Instagram facts and stats for brands

‍#24. Instagram is an effective platform for selling products

70 percent of shoppers go to Instagram when looking for their next purchase. So selling on the platform is an effective way to engage with your audience and drive sales to your business. 

‍

#25. The majority of your target audience is on the platform 

According to Instagram, 90% of people follow a brand on Instagram. This means that audiences want to hear and connect with the brands that they love. But it's important to note that being on Instagram is one thing. You also need to be creative and also consistently as you are competing with over 200 million other business accounts. One way to ensure that you post quality content regularly is by planning your content ahead of time.

‍

#26. A lot of customers are shopping via Instagram every month

Instagram reports that 130 million people tap on the product tags in shopping posts each month. 

Instagram saw a good boost in customers shopping via their platform during the COVID-19 pandemic. Since people couldn’t go out and had to rely on online shopping, Instagram introduced ecommerce features to help connect buyers and sellers. These features include Instagram Shopping Tab, Checkout, Live Shopping, Products Tags, and Shopping Stickers on Stories.

‍

#27. Posting about your brand in Stories is an effective way to encourage your audience to interact with you

Instagram even says that 58% of people have become more interested in a brand or product after seeing it in their stories. 50% also say that they have visited a website to buy a product or service after seeing it in Stories.

‍

#28. Instagram Stories generates at least a quarter of Instagram’s revenue

Even though Stories do not have as much reach as regular posts, they still bring in a lot of revenue for Instagram. Insider Intelligence predicts that Stories will generate up to 20 billion dollars in net revenue in 2023

‍

#29 One in two people uses Instagram to discover new brands, products, and services. And by being active on the platform, you make it easy for your target audience to find you. 

‍

#30. Instagram users love quizzes and polls 

Instagram carried out a survey and 57% of the respondents said that they preferred to see quizzes and polls from brands on Instagram compared to other platforms. 

You can easily create and share quizzes and polls in Stories. 

‍

Instagram content statistics

There are a lot of content options to choose from on Instagram. These stats will help you understand which options get the most engagement.

‍

#31. Posts that have geo-location get 79 percent more engagement than posts without a tagged location

‍

#32. Sharing selfie posts can help you get more engagement

Photos on Instagram that show a face gets 38% more likes than photos without one. They also get 32% more comments. 

‍

#33. Instagram video posts get twice as much engagement as any post type

‍Video posts receive on average more likes and comments. In fact, the average Instagram post receives 100 comments. Video posts on the other hand will receive on average 150 comments.

‍

#34. Brands saw less organic engagement in 2022

...even though most brands have increased their posting frequency across all channels. RivalIQ reported that Instagram’s engagement rate fell by about 30% in 2022. In 2021, the median Instagram engagement rate per post (by follower) was 0.98%. In 2022, it is 0.67%. 

‍

‍

#35. Carousel posts receive the highest engagement rate per impression on Instagram

An Instagram study by SocialInsider found that regardless of account size, carousel posts receive on average more engagement per impression when compared to video and image posts. The study also showed that smaller accounts under 5000 followers have the highest carousel engagement rates per impression at 8.01% 

‍

‍

#36. Brands need to upload to their Stories at least 5 times a day to help boost audience retention rate

By posting at least five stories a day, you can increase your audience retention rate by over 70%. 

‍

‍

#37. Compared to social networks like Twitter and Facebook, Instagram isn’t a popular news source for users

According to a 2021 survey, only around 11% of respondents said that they regularly get news on Instagram. And 42% said that they didn't trust the information they get on the platform. 

‍

Ready for 2023? These Instagram statistics will help you identify the marketing strategies that worked in 2022 and also help you stay on top of the latest trends.