Instagram · Creators
Top Instagram Influencers to Follow in 2026
25 of the most-followed creator-first Instagram accounts still posting in 2026, grouped by what they make, each verified from public sources.
Short answer
The top Instagram influencers to follow in 2026 are the creator-first accounts that are still posting, not the actors and athletes who dominate the raw follower rankings. This list has 25 of them, grouped by what they make: entertainment, comedy and short video (10), beauty and fashion (4), fitness and food (5), education and science (3), and lifestyle and vlogs (3). Every entry links the creator’s Instagram and the other places we verified them.
This list is for anyone who searches “top Instagram influencers” and gets back a wall of celebrities. Wikipedia’s own list of the most-followed Instagram accounts is footballers, pop stars, actors and brands almost to the last row; exactly one of its top fifty built a public profile on social content first, and he is on this list. The 25 people below all did, and they are still making it.
“Top” means the most-followed creator-first accounts in each group who are still active, not an order. The entries are alphabetical, because a toddler educator, a chef and a Brazilian stand-up comedian don’t compete for the same follow. Each entry says who the person is, what they make now, and where we confirmed it.
Which Instagram creator should you follow?
Start with the kind of content you want in your feed. Everyone in the table is on the list below, alphabetical within each row.
| If you want… | Creators to start with | What they make |
|---|---|---|
| Entertainment, comedy and short video | Bhuvan Bam, Brent Rivera, Charli D’Amelio, Hannah Stocking, IShowSpeed, Kai Cenat, Khaby Lame, Lilly Singh, MrBeast, Whindersson Nunes | Wordless shorts, daily skits, character comedy, dance, stream clips, elaborate challenges and stand-up showcases |
| Beauty and fashion | Manny MUA, NikkieTutorials, PatrickStarrr, Wisdom Kaye | Tutorials, drugstore-versus-high-end tests, transformations and high-fashion looks judged by viewers |
| Fitness and food | Joe Wicks, Joshua Weissman, Kayla Itsines, Nick DiGiovanni, Pamela Reif | Real-time workouts, training programs, cooking challenges and kitchen tests |
| Education and science | Doctor Mike, Mark Rober, Ms Rachel | Medical debunking, popular science and engineering, early-language lessons for toddlers |
| Lifestyle and vlogs | Alix Earle, Juanpa Zurita, Luisito Comunica | Get-ready-with-me videos, personal shorts and travel with a consumer’s eye |
Seven of the creators here have compiled interviews on the blog, built from their public interviews with every quote sourced and dated, and each of those entries links its own.
The 25 creators, A to Z
- Covers
- Get-ready-with-me videos, vlogs and guest chats
- Why they’re here
- Rose to fame posting “Get Ready With Me” videos on TikTok that share details of her own life. Her podcast, Hot Mess, describes itself as her life “in front and behind the camera — vlogs, GRWMs, special guests”, and her recent uploads are that mix. Her own brand, Reale Actives, is named in several recent titles.
- Start with
- @alix_earle on Instagram
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- Covers
- Character comedy from BB Ki Vines, cut for shorts
- Why they’re here
- A Delhi comedian known for his YouTube comedy channel, BB Ki Vines. His About text calls him a creator, actor and entrepreneur who built the BB Ki Vines universe from the ground up, and his latest uploads cut an episode of his series Dhindora into ten short parts.
- Start with
- @bhuvan.bam22 on Instagram
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- Covers
- Weekly challenge videos and short skits
- Why they’re here
- First found an audience on Vine, and his About text promises a new YouTube video every week. Recent uploads mix challenge-style long videos (“20 Scary Things We Found on Google Maps!”) with short skits, and several promote his own chip brand, Levels, which his TikTok bio announces outright.
- Start with
- @brentrivera on Instagram
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- Covers
- Dance shorts, monthly vlogs and fashion week
- Why they’re here
- A competitive dancer who became TikTok’s most-followed creator in 2020 on the strength of dance videos. Her TikTok bio says she posts on YouTube on Saturdays “for the most part”, and the feed bears it out: a monthly vlog (“october vlog | adelá concert, cleaning my closet, earrings etc”), a Milan Fashion Week vlog and a run of dance shorts. Our compiled interview collects what she has said about life after TikTok fame.
- Start with
- @charlidamelio on Instagram
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- Covers
- A practising doctor reacting to medical claims
- Why they’re here
- A practising family-medicine physician whose Instagram account went viral in 2015, before the YouTube channel. His About text sets the brief as making medicine “relatable, understandable, and fun”, and the recent feed is reactions and debunkings: medical TikToks that trigger doctors, the worst talk-show medical advice, a 9-1-1 episode reviewed with an astronaut.
- Start with
- @doctor.mike on Instagram
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- Covers
- Near-daily comedy skits with everyday premises
- Why they’re here
- A comedian who got her start on Vine and moved her sketches to YouTube. Her feed is a near-daily run of short skits with everyday premises (“How girls pack for a day trip”, “When you’re running late”, “Me and my friends vs. a piñata”), and the occasional promotional short names the film or brand in its title rather than hiding it.
- Start with
- @hannahstocking on Instagram
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- Covers
- Stream archives, stunts and football challenges
- Why they’re here
- A streamer known, in Wikipedia’s words, for the dramatic and energetic behaviour of his variety and in-real-life streams. His YouTube feed is stream archives and stunts: going back to school, a shift at KFC, a precision challenge, a tug-of-war challenge. Brand tie-ins sit in the titles themselves (“APPLE SENT ME THE NEW IPHONE 18”, a branded tailgate).
- Start with
- @ishowspeed on Instagram
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- Covers
- Weekly home workouts and wellness trends tested
- Why they’re here
- The Body Coach, a British fitness coach who started with 15-second recipe videos on social media. His About text promises weekly home workouts and the feed delivers them (“15 Minute Dumbbell Strength”, “Strength in Menopause”), alongside a new series, Health or Hype, in which he tests wellness trends on himself; its titles name the company behind it. His app is pitched in the About text.
- Start with
- @thebodycoach on Instagram
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- Covers
- Cooking tests, challenges and kitchen-gadget trials
- Why they’re here
- A chef and cookbook author whose main platform is his cooking channel. His About text calls him obsessive about bread; the recent feed leans on tests and challenges: every viral struggle meal, the cheapest versus the most expensive kitchen gadgets, rice-cooker hacks, fast food that no longer exists. His Instagram is the first link in that About text.
- Start with
- @joshuaweissman on Instagram
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- Covers
- Personal Spanish-language shorts and dares
- Why they’re here
- Started with comedy videos on Vine in 2013 and moved to vlogs and entertainment videos on YouTube, per Wikipedia. His recent uploads are short, personal Spanish-language clips: a cliff-diving dare, a moustache his father didn’t rate, a favour for a film star and a director, shot on 16mm. Sponsored shorts carry the partner’s name or a partner hashtag in the title, so they’re easy to tell apart.
- Start with
- @juanpazurita on Instagram
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- Covers
- Comedic live streams, marathon game runs and clips
- Why they’re here
- A streamer who, per Wikipedia, specialises in comedic live streams and is the most-subscribed streamer on Twitch. His Kai Cenat Live channel carries the streams and the clips cut from them: marathon game runs (“Not Ending Until I Beat OUTLAST”), bits with the friends he streams with, and his Streamer University boot camp. Our compiled interview collects what he has said about what makes the streams work.
- Start with
- @kaicenat on Instagram
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- Covers
- Women’s training programs, family and motivation
- Why they’re here
- An Australian personal trainer and co-creator of the Bikini Body Guides and the Sweat app. Her About text says she has trained women since 2008 and lists her five programs in the app by name; her recent uploads are short family-and-training clips (“Morning Movement”, “Dear mums”) rather than full workouts, which live in the app. The app is the pitch, stated plainly.
- Start with
- @kayla_itsines on Instagram
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- Covers
- Wordless comedy shorts, about one a week
- Why they’re here
- The most-followed user on TikTok, known for silently mocking over-complicated life hacks. His YouTube About text points to this Instagram handle and tags everything #learnfromkhaby; the feed is a wordless comedy short roughly every week (“Just give me 5 more minutes”, “Next time let me choose the restaurant”). Our compiled interview collects what he has said about going global without saying a word.
- Start with
- @khaby00 on Instagram
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- Covers
- Sketches and conversations, back on YouTube
- Why they’re here
- Began making YouTube videos in 2010 as Superwoman and went on to television. Her About text reads “Actress. Comedian. Daddy. Funny stuff lives here”, and a September upload titled “I’m coming back to YouTube.” is followed by sketches (“If My Trauma Was Sports Commentary”) and sit-down conversations with guests. Our compiled interview collects what she has said about the move from YouTube to late-night TV.
- Start with
- @lilly on Instagram
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- Covers
- Travel vlogs with a consumer’s eye, in Spanish
- Why they’re here
- A Mexican YouTuber whose channel Wikipedia ranks among the most-subscribed in the Spanish-speaking world. His uploads are travel vlogs with a consumer’s eye: a two-star hotel he bought, a hotel that costs thousands a night and isn’t worth it, street food and the cost of getting into Cape Verde. His TikTok bio currently leads with a footwear collaboration, labelled as one.
- Start with
- @luisitocomunica on Instagram
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- Covers
- Drugstore makeup tested against high-end
- Why they’re here
- A make-up artist who founded his own cosmetics company, Lunar Beauty, in 2018. His About text says makeup is “GenderLESS and has no rules”, and the recent feed is almost all drugstore testing: items that beat high-end, dupes, a full face from a dollar store, every new drugstore launch with the gimmicks called out. His own brand is in his TikTok bio.
- Start with
- @mannymua733 on Instagram
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- Covers
- Popular science and engineering with a hook
- Why they’re here
- A former NASA engineer who spent seven years on the Curiosity rover and now makes popular-science videos. His About text explains the monthly engineering toy his company CrunchLabs ships to subscribers, and the feed is science with a hook: why people pass out on roller coasters, why the Moon never changes, how he outsmarted car thieves. Our compiled interview collects what he has said about making science go viral.
- Start with
- @markrober on Instagram
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- Covers
- Elaborate challenges, giveaways and philanthropy videos
- Why they’re here
- The founder of Beast Industries and, per Wikipedia, the maker of high-paced videos built around elaborate challenges and philanthropic efforts, on the most-subscribed channel on YouTube. His About text promises a new MrBeast or MrBeast Gaming video every Saturday at noon Eastern and lists what the channel has funded, from planting trees to building houses; the recent feed is the challenges (“Last To Leave Mansion, Keeps It”, “Can We Build an Entire Village?”) and the giveaways. Our compiled interview collects what he has said about his rules for viral videos.
- Start with
- @mrbeast on Instagram
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- Covers
- Songs and lessons for toddlers’ early language
- Why they’re here
- A teacher whose series combines original songs and classic children’s music to support early language development. Her About text says the videos use techniques recommended by speech therapists and that she holds a master’s in music education; recent uploads are long learning episodes (“Learn to Talk for Babies and Toddlers”) and songs from a first album, which her TikTok bio announces. Our compiled interview collects what she has said about building a classroom on YouTube.
- Start with
- @msrachelforlittles on Instagram
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- Covers
- Short cooking videos with a twist in every title
- Why they’re here
- A chef and social-media personality, in Wikipedia’s words, whose TikTok bio is simply “follow if you love food”. The YouTube feed is short-form cooking with a twist in every title: a one-dollar knife against a very expensive one, chicken cooked for one second versus one hour, ten levels of spicy food, 3D-printed kitchen gadgets. Little talk, a lot of cooking on screen.
- Start with
- @nick.digiovanni on Instagram
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- Covers
- Makeup tutorials, product tests and hacks
- Why they’re here
- The Dutch make-up artist behind “The Power of Makeup”, the 2015 video that started a wave of with-and-without-makeup videos. Her feed is tutorials and tests: a full-glam routine, nude lips done with concealer, a button nose-contour hack, silver-foil lips. Her About text notes that she falls under the supervision of the Dutch media regulator, and her TikTok bio links her own beauty brand.
- Start with
- @nikkietutorials on Instagram
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- Covers
- Real-time home workouts and free schedules
- Why they’re here
- A German fitness creator who, per Wikipedia, also writes books and owns the food brand Naturally Pam. Her About text promises free real-time workout videos and a free workout schedule on Instagram every second Sunday; the recent uploads are the workouts themselves (“10 MIN STRONG CORE”, “20 MIN RDL BOOTY”). Her app and food brand are named in her own About text and TikTok bio.
- Start with
- @pamela_rf on Instagram
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- Covers
- Beauty transformations and founder vlogs
- Why they’re here
- A make-up artist whose About text sums the channel up as “beauty transformations meet founder storytelling”, and says plainly that the brand ONE/SIZE Beauty is his. The feed is daily shorts: transformations with other artists, facials in his skin studio, get-ready-with-me clips from Athens, and a Sephora in Greece that stocks his brand.
- Start with
- @patrickstarrr on Instagram
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- Covers
- Brazilian stand-up showcases and clips
- Why they’re here
- A Brazilian comedian whose channel was once the most-subscribed in Brazil, per Wikipedia. His current feed is a stand-up showcase called Comédia na DabliuTV: full sets from guest comedians, a guest of the week, and short clips cut from the sets, all in Portuguese.
- Start with
- @whinderssonnunes on Instagram
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- Covers
- High-fashion looks judged by his viewers
- Why they’re here
- A model and fashion creator Vogue called “TikTok’s best-dressed guy”, a line he quotes in his own TikTok bio. His recent YouTube uploads are a “High Fashion World Cup”: 48 countries, 48 looks, with viewers deciding the winner group by group. A sponsored fragrance video names the brand in its title.
- Start with
- @wisdm on Instagram
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How we checked each creator
The honest first line: we could not read Instagram. Its pages and its API sit behind a login wall from where we work, and the site owner chose not to use a logged-in browser for this, so nothing on this page comes from Instagram itself. For each creator we:
- Confirmed who they are from their English Wikipedia summary, and kept only people whose fame is as a creator. Wikipedia’s one-line description decided the edge cases: someone it now calls a singer or an actress is out, however big their following.
- Took the Instagram handle from a page we fetched: their Wikipedia article, their YouTube About text or channel links, their verified TikTok bio, or their own link page. No handle here was guessed or taken from a third-party ranking.
- Checked they’re active somewhere we can see. Every creator here has at least three uploads in the last 90 days on their YouTube channel’s public feed, or, in one case, a podcast feed as well. Instagram posting activity itself was not checked, because we couldn’t read it.
- Read the section headings of each Wikipedia article and left out anyone with a dedicated section on a current legal, harassment or fraud controversy. We can’t adjudicate those, and a brand can’t stand next to them. Some of the biggest names in our interview series are missing for that reason, or for lack of verifiable activity.
Selection by reach used a follower floor for the niche, applied with public rankings of creator accounts and each person’s own pages rather than scraped counts. The floor exists; we don’t print it, and we don’t print any follower numbers, because we only publish Instagram and TikTok figures that come from the creator or an approved API. Our methodology covers the rules every list follows.
How to follow a big Instagram creator without getting sold to
Everyone here takes brand deals, sells their own products, or both. That’s fine as long as you can see it. Four things to know:
- Look for the paid-partnership label. Instagram’s help centre says that when a creator posts organic branded content, its branded content policies “require that you use the paid partnership label to tag the brand you are working with”, in Feed, Stories, Broadcast Channels, Live, Reels and videos. The brand’s name shows in the “Paid partnership with” label once the brand approves the tag; the Instagram help page explains the mechanics.
- A label isn’t the whole story. The FTC’s guide for influencers says not to assume “a platform’s disclosure tool is good enough”, and to add a clear disclosure of your own: place it “so it’s hard to miss”, don’t mix it “into a group of hashtags or links”, and for video, put it “in the video and not just in the description”. See the FTC’s Disclosures 101 for social media influencers.
- Affiliate links in bios need a label too. Many of the creators above route everything through a link page. The FTC’s endorsement guides FAQ says a “Paid link” label right next to an affiliate link “should be an adequate disclosure”, and that listing a relationship on a profile page alone “isn’t enough”. A link page full of discount codes with no label: treat every link as paid.
- Give credit for naming the brand in the title. Several creators here put the sponsor or their own brand in the video title or bio: a food brand, a fitness app, a fragrance, a chip company. That is what the rules are trying to produce. We cover what YouTube, TikTok and Instagram each expect in how to disclose affiliate links and sponsorships, and the same instincts apply when judging whether a tool review is honest.
What to do next
- Building your feed? Pick the row in the table that matches what you want and follow two creators from it.
- A brand looking for creators? These names are the top of the market; our guide to vetting a creator before a sponsorship is written for the mid-sized ones who will answer your email.
- Want smaller, more specific lists? The rest of our lists are built the other way round: niche first, reach second.
- Know someone who belongs here? Suggest a creator. Suggestions go through the same checks as everyone else, and we review this list every quarter.
Frequently asked questions
- Who are the best Instagram influencers to follow in 2026?
- It depends what you want in your feed. For entertainment, comedy and short video: Bhuvan Bam, Brent Rivera, Charli D’Amelio, Hannah Stocking, IShowSpeed, Kai Cenat, Khaby Lame, Lilly Singh, MrBeast and Whindersson Nunes. For beauty and fashion: Manny MUA, NikkieTutorials, PatrickStarrr and Wisdom Kaye. For fitness and food: Joe Wicks, Joshua Weissman, Kayla Itsines, Nick DiGiovanni and Pamela Reif. For education and science: Doctor Mike, Mark Rober and Ms Rachel. For lifestyle and vlogs: Alix Earle, Juanpa Zurita and Luisito Comunica.
- Did any of these creators pay to be on this list?
- No. Nobody pays to be included, inclusion never depends on using or promoting any product, and nobody on this list was asked to mention one. Nobody here was contacted at all: this is a reach list of public figures, built from public sources, and each entry says which.
- How did you choose these Instagram influencers?
- We started from public most-followed rankings, kept only creator-first accounts, and verified each person three ways: who they are from their English Wikipedia summary, their Instagram handle from a page we fetched (their Wikipedia article, YouTube About text, verified TikTok bio or own site), and at least three uploads or episodes in the last 90 days on a feed we could read. We also checked each Wikipedia article for current legal or controversy sections.
- Why are the creators listed alphabetically?
- Because this isn’t a ranking. “Top” here means the most-followed creator-first accounts who are still active, and a toddler educator, a chef and a stand-up comedian serve different people. Alphabetical order also makes it obvious that no position was bought or traded.
- Why are there no follower counts on this page?
- Two reasons. We only publish Instagram and TikTok numbers that come from the creator or an approved platform API, and YouTube numbers only from the YouTube Data API, dated and refreshed within 30 days. And Instagram itself can’t be read from where we work, so any count we showed would be second-hand. We’d rather show no number than a stale or estimated one.
- How can I tell when one of these creators is being paid to post?
- Look for the “Paid partnership with” label above the post, which Instagram’s branded content policies require for organic branded content. The FTC also expects a disclosure that’s hard to miss, in the video itself for video, not buried in hashtags or a bio, and affiliate links in a bio or link page should be labelled next to the link. Many creators here also name the brand in the title, which is a good sign.
About this list
We review every list each quarter. This one was last reviewed on . Every number is dated and says where it came from. How we pick creators.
Spot a mistake? Email corrections@topfluencers.co and we’ll fix it within 48 hours.
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