- News influencers – People who regularly post about current events and civic issues on social media and have at least 100,000 followers on any of Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X (formerly Twitter) or YouTube.
- Political orientation – A measure of a news influencer’s partisan or ideological views. A right-leaning news influencer is one who publicly expresses that they identify as a Republican or conservative or support Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election. A left-leaning news influencer is one who publicly expresses that they identify as a Democrat, liberal or progressive or support Vice President Kamala Harris (or supported President Joe Biden before he dropped out of the race) in the 2024 election. This information was found in the bio, profile picture, banner image, pinned posts or recent posts on an influencer’s social media account, any personal website or professional page, and prominent media coverage.
- Values and identities – Language or imagery in the bio, profile picture, banner image or pinned posts on an influencer’s social media account that expresses specific beliefs or identities.
- News organization affiliation – An influencer with this affiliation is one who either currently works for or previously worked for a news organization, as well as freelancers who have regularly contributed to news organizations. A news organization can be any news outlet that has a staff and multiple bylines. Researchers considered affiliated influencers to have this background regardless of their news organization’s political orientation, audience size or primary publishing method (digital, TV, print, etc.).
- Major social media sites – The five primary sites we studied, chosen based on audience size and the presence of discussion about news: Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X (formerly Twitter) and YouTube.
A majority of Instagram news influencers (57%) explicitly claim a clear political party or ideology. Within this group, slightly more say they are on the political right (30% of all Instagram news influencers) than the left (25%).
Influencers were categorized by whether they identify with a political party or ideology or expressed support for the Democratic or Republican presidential candidate in their social media profile, posts, personal website or media coverage.
About this chapter
This chapter looks at news influencers on Instagram. Virtually all of them also have accounts on other sites. For analysis of news influencers in general across social media sites, read the report overview.
In this report, news influencers are people with large followings on social media sites who regularly post about current events or civic issues. Refer to the methodology for details.
Related: Instagram users’ experiences with news
Some news influencers on Instagram also identify with specific groups or causes. For instance, 7% identify as LGBTQ+ or pro-LGBTQ+ rights, and 7% are pro-Palestinian, while 3% are pro-Israeli. These positions can be expressed in words, images or emojis (including flags).
About twice as many Instagram news influencers are men (63%) as are women (32%). By contrast, among Americans who regularly get news on Instagram, 59% are women.
Refer to the methodology for details on how researchers categorized news influencers by gender.
Eight-in-ten news influencers on Instagram (80%) do not have a current or former affiliation with a news organization. But 20% have worked in the news industry in some capacity.
For more details on the differences between influencers who have worked for a news organization and those who have not, read Chapter 4.
What are Instagram news influencers posting about?
To get a sense of what news influencers are posting about, researchers collected and analyzed all public posts by the 500 news influencers in our sample for three separate weeks: July 15-21, July 29-Aug. 4 and Aug. 19-25.
There were many major events related to the election in or around these weeks, including the first assassination attempt on Donald Trump on July 13, the Republican National Convention July 15-18, President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the race July 21 and the Democratic National Convention Aug. 19-22.
While 43% of posts by Instagram news influencers that focused on current events during this period were about politics or the election, this was lower than the share of political posts on other sites. Instead, a relatively high share of Instagram posts focused on social issues (21%) and international issues (18%).
Many of the posts about social issues focused on race (7% of all news-related posts) or LGBTQ+ issues (3%). And a large majority of the internationally focused posts were about the Israel-Hamas war (14%). Instagram had a much higher percentage of posts about this war than any other site during this period.
What other sites are Instagram news influencers on?
Virtually all news influencers on Instagram are also on at least one other site. In other words, there are almost no influencers whose presence is entirely on Instagram.
In fact, about three-quarters (78%) of all Instagram news influencers are on at least three other sites, including about half (51%) who are on four or more sites (in addition to Instagram).
The most common other social media site for Instagram news influencers is X: 83% of Instagram news influencers are also on the site, formerly known as Twitter. About two-thirds (65%) are also on YouTube, and more than half (56%) are on Facebook. Fewer Instagram news influencers are also on TikTok (45%).
Not only are Instagram news influencers on other sites, but many also have other ways of connecting with their audiences beyond social media. About four-in-ten (43%) host a podcast, and a quarter have a newsletter that fans can subscribe to.
Like news influencers on other social media sites, most of those on Instagram seek financial support from their audiences. This includes 57% who offer subscriptions (Instagram offers a subscription tool), 39% who solicit donations and 31% who sell merchandise. Overall, 72% use at least one of these methods to bring in money.
A small share of Instagram news influencers (8%) also have a public Discord server where they can further connect with fans and followers.
