Although Haaland was the most successful player on Instagram during World Cup2026, Cape Verde's goalkeeper, Vozinha, had a growth of around 98,000% as regards the number of followers on the social network.
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22/07/2026
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Meven though the World Cup2026 ended last Sunday, all conversations in digital space seem to continue to involve competition, certain players and many of the “memes” that have populated social networks over the past few weeks.
It is then interesting to try to understand which players won the most followers during the period of the World Cup2026, which also ends up telling us a lot about those who were the conversations and interests of netizens during the competition.
According to data compiled by sportico website, the player most followers accumulated during the World Cup2026 was Norwegian Erling Haaland. The Manchester City player began the competition with 40.6 million followers and ended it with 72.7 million followers, earning a total of 32.1 million followers.
In second place appears Grandma, the already iconic goalkeeper of the Cape Verde selection and that at the beginning of the competition was the one with the lowest number of Instagram followers among the lot of players present in this table. You had only 30,000 followers, but after becoming one of the great phenomena of this World Cup edition, you now have 29.4 million followers. We're talking about an increase in followers around 98,000%.
In third position we have English Jude Bellingham, one of the great players of the England team and also one of the protagonists of the World Cup2026. The player gained 12 million followers during the competition period and now has 53.3 million followers.
Although it only appears in fourth place, the captain of Portugal's selection, Cristiano Ronaldo, cemented its place as the person most followed throughout Instagram. After winning 11.4 million additional followers, the Portuguese international now accumulates 677 million people who follow their social network account.
Closing the top five places we have the Lamine Yamal, the young star of the Spanish team who eventually became the winner of the World Cup2026. During the competition, Yamal gained 11 million followers and is now with a total of 54.3 million followers.
Next, in the sixth position, appears the first Brazilian player in this table. Although little played during the competition due to physical problems, Neymar exits the 2026 World Cup with a total of 242 million followers, after winning more 7.7 million followers on Instagram.
Then and in seventh place we have Lionel Messi. The captain of the Argentina national team was present at the World Cup finals2026 and although his team failed to beat Spain, Messi added 7.5 million more people to the number of Instagram followers and now has a total of 514 million followers.
In the last places of this table we find Gilberto Mora (from Mexico) with more 6.6 million followers than he had before World War 2026, the French Michael Olise with more 5.7 million followers and the brazilian Endrick with over 5.6 million followers.