The world of sport is big business, attracting audiences from all over the world and launching athletes into global superstardom.
Thanks to their presence as major sporting icons, these athletes can attract huge numbers of followers on social media. Now, brands are racing to sign them for advertisements, promoting their products and boosting sales.
But which athletes are making a mint on social media?
The experts at Spin Genie UK have dived into the data, looking at each athlete’s estimated earnings per post on Instagram and TikTok and averaging out these earnings to find the sports with the highest earners.
The highest-earning athletes on Instagram
1. Lewis Hamilton, Formula One £41,947 per post
Lewis Hamilton can be crowned the highest-paid athlete on social media. The Formula One driver who recently shook the racing world with a surprise move to Ferrari next season earns an estimated £41,947 per Instagram post.
2. Harry Kane, Football £14,248 per post
Up next is England football captain Harry Kane. Considered one of the world’s best players, Kane moved to Bayern Munich in 2023 after 317 appearances and 213 goals for Tottenham Hotspur. He earns an estimated £14,248 per Instagram post.
3. Lando Norris, Formula One £12,019 per post
Formula One driver Lando Norris earns an estimated £12,019 per Instagram post. The racing driver currently races for McLaren and holds the record for most podium places without a win at 14.
The highest-earning athletes on TikTok
1. Harry Kane, Football £4,014 per post
Footballer Harry Kane places first, earning an estimated £4,014 per post on TikTok. Kane is considered one of the England squad’s greatest goal-scorers, netting 62 goals over 89 appearances.
2. Bukayo Saka, Football £3,034 per post
Taking second place is the footballer who plays as a midfielder for both Arsenal and the English national team, Bukayo Saka. Since joining the squad in 2018, Saka has been named Arsenal's player of the season twice and earns an estimated £3,034 per post on TikTok.
3. Sky Brown, Skateboarding and Surfing £2,845 per post
Rounding off the top three is the professional skateboarder and surfer Sky Brown. She is currently the world’s youngest pro skateboarder and represented Great Britain at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, becoming Team GB’s youngest Olympic medal winner. She earns an estimated £2,845 per TikTok post. Sky Brown also plans to win an Olympic Gold medal at the 2024 Paris Games.
The sports with the highest earners on social media
1. Formula One £7,272 per post
Formula One takes pole position as the sport with the highest average social media earnings, with athletes raking in an average of £7,272 per post. This is thanks to the enormous sums Lewis Hamilton and Lando Norris make per post on Instagram at £41,947 and £12,019, respectively.
2. Football £4,178 per post
Footballers are the second highest-paid athletes when it comes to social media posts, earning an estimated £4,178 per post. Harry Kane is the highest average earner of the 13 footballers on the list, averaging more than £9,000 per post across both Instagram and TikTok.
3. Heptathlon £3,263 per post
Despite only having one heptathlete on the list, the sport takes third place, with Katarina Johnson-Thompson earning £3,263 per post across both Instagram and TikTok. Johnson-Thompson is a double world champion and Commonwealth Games champion in the heptathlon.
The athletes with the highest Instagram likes to followers
1. Mark Selby, Snooker 16.62% likes to followers
With 16.62% of likes to followers on Instagram, the snooker player Mark Selby is the sportsperson with the highest engagement rate on Instagram. Selby has been ranked world number one in the sport on multiple occasions and has won the World Snooker Championship on four occasions and the Masters three times.
2. James Anderson, Cricket 14.80% likes to followers
Up next is the cricketer James Anderson. The first fast bowler to take 700 wickets in test match cricket, a record he set this year, Anderson is widely regarded as one of the best bowlers ever. He’s also very popular on Instagram. With a 14.80% like-to-follower ratio, he takes second place.
3. Katarina Johnson-Thompson, Athletics 12.02% likes to followers
In third place is the heptathlete Katarina Johnson-Thompson, with a 12.02% like-to-follower ratio on Instagram. She holds the British outdoor high jump record and is also a double world champion & double Commonwealth Games champion in heptathlon.
The athletes with the most TikTok Likes
1. Sky Brown, Skateboarding and Surfing 56,100,000 likes
When it comes to TikTok likes, the professional skateboarder and surfer Sky Brown takes the top spot with over 56 million TikTok likes. Rather than relying on a skateboarding coach, Brown teaches herself tricks from YouTube videos. This approach has paid off, as she was the first female competitor to land a frontside 540 at the X Games.
2. Harry Kane, Football 17,000,000 likes
The Bayern Munich striker and England captain Harry Kane takes second place with 17 million total likes. Beginning his senior career at Tottenham Hotspur, Kane was named Young Footballer of the Year after his first full season at the club and was the Premier League’s top goal scorer in the 2015 and 2016 seasons.
3. Lando Norris, Formula One 15,500,000 likes
Tom Daley, Diving
Lando Norris, the Formula One racing driver who recently placed second at the Chinese Grand Prix, shares third place with 15.5 million likes for his TikTok posts. Norris started his racing career at seven, racing go-karts before joining Formula One with McLaren in 2021.
Tom Daley also takes third place with 15.5 million likes on the platform. Daley recently took home the silver medal in the men's synchronised 10-metre event at the Diving World Cup in China alongside his diving partner Noah Williams.
The athletes with the most Instagram Posts
1. Ian Poulter, Golf 2,840 posts
The golfer Ian Poulter is the most active athlete on Instagram, with a whopping 2,840 posts on the platform. Poulter, who plays in the controversial Saudi Arabia-backed LIV Golf League, has 21 tour wins under his belt and was previously ranked number five in the world at the sport.
2. Tom Daley, Diving 2,207 posts
The Olympic gold medal-winning diver Tom Daley is up next with 2,207 posts on his Instagram account. Daley is the first British diver to win four Olympic medals and has campaigned against countries with strict anti-LGBTQ+ laws to be banned from hosting the Olympic Games.
3. Anthony Joshua, Boxing 2,074 posts
Anthony Joshua takes third place as Instagram’s most prolific athlete, racking up over 2,000 posts on the platform. The superheavyweight previously won gold at the 2012 Olympics and is set to headline a major fight for the International Boxing Federation world title at Wembley this September.
The athletes with the most TikTok Posts
1. Sky Brown, Skateboarding and Surfing 866 posts
The pro skateboarder and surfer Sky Brown takes the top spot for her total TikTok posts, way out in front with 866 posts. Along with her Olympic bronze, Brown was the first British winner of the World Skateboard Championships and the youngest Nike-sponsored athlete.
2. Ian Poulter, Golf 249 posts
Ian Poulter is the second most active athlete on TikTok, having 249 posts on the platform. The golfer has previously been part of five Ryder Cup-winning teams and twice won the World Golf Championships.
3. Max Whitlock, Gymnastics 142 posts
Max Whitlock, the Team GB gymnast specialising in the pommel horse, rounds off the top three. Whitlock is one of Britain’s most successful gymnasts, winning fourteen medals and three Olympic golds. He’s also prolific on TikTok, with 142 posts on the platform.
Methodology
Beginning with a list of the UK’s most popular athletes taken from YouGov, we used HypeAuditor to find the estimated earnings per post for each athlete on Instagram. We then used Tikcalculator to find their earnings on TikTok.
Using this data, which considers both follower numbers and engagement rates, we found the estimated average earnings per post on social media for each athlete.
To find the sports with the biggest earners, we took an average of the average earnings per social media post grouped by the sport the athletes are best known for.
We used HypeAuditor to find the ratio of likes to followers on Instagram and took the total number of posts from each athlete’s official Instagram account.
We also gathered the total number of likes for each athlete’s TikTok account and used Tokcounter to find the total number of posts on each athlete’s TikTok account.
All data is correct as of 23/04/2024.
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