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Cristiano Ronaldo is potentially embracing an all-new role — content creation! The globally renowned Portuguese footballer who is currently captaining Saudi Pro League club Al Nassr recently joined YouTube in what was a headline-spinning entry on Wednesday, August 21. As per an Al Jazeera report, more than a million followers, 1.69M to be precise, had hit the subscribe button on Ronaldo’s channel in all of 90 minutes — hands down a world record. Not just this, over the next 24 hours, Ronaldo’s channel went on to cross the 10 million mark in another record-breaking win. The still-rapidly growing number has now zoomed past the 12 million mark as well.
When and if Ronaldo manages to overtake the two most-followed YouTube channels — that of Mr. Beast and T-Series India, which keep tussling for the top spot — only time will tell. Regardless, let’s take a look at some other social media records set by our favourite celebrities.
When Kylie Jenner beat Beyoncé
We all remember this. Kylie Jenner’s iron grip over social media fame (and infamy) was an era of its own. Kylie however, was quick to ditch her party girl era, embracing motherhood when she was all of 20-years old. Her pregnancy came as an absolute dart out of the blue, the excitement for which was well captured in the first photo she shared of her daughter Stormi Webster, introducing her to the world in 2018. The post is just shy of the 18 million mark in terms of likes.
Kylie unassumingly dethroned Beyoncé, whose twin pregnancy announcement from 2017 had been the highest at the time.
Kylie too however, was dethroned the very next year. By an egg. The funny thing about this whole situation is that the lifeless picture of the egg, was posted with the very specific intention of dethroning Kylie and the internet banded together to make it happen. The egg post currently stands at over 61 million likes.
And Lionel Messi beat the egg!
It would be a few years before the egg would be dethroned and that too by football legend Lionel Messi. Back in December of 2022. The post was a carousel celebrating Argentina’s FIFA World Cup 2022 victory and it understandably left the egg behind by a million miles, or 15, pun intended.
YouTube isn’t Ronaldo’s only social media record
Besides the official Instagram handle, which stands at 676 million followers, the most-followed individual on Instagram is none other than Ronaldo with a whooping 636 million followers.
He is followed by fellow footballer Messi who is at 504 million. Selena Gomez and Kylie Jenner keep inching ahead of each other swapping spots 3 and 4 with 425 million and 398 million followers respectively.
Luis Fonsi peaked with Despacito
The mere mention of 2017 is unmissable without the hook of Despacito ringing in our ears. Luis Fonsi, in collaboration with Daddy Yankee, spun quite literal magic in a single which had the whole world swaying for months on end. And this is no exaggeration.
Fonsi is the holder of 7 Guinness World Records including ‘most-streamed track worldwide’, ‘first YouTube video to reach 5 billion views’, ‘most-viewed video online, ‘most weeks at number one on Billboard’s Hot Latin Songs chart’, ‘most-liked video online’ and ‘most-viewed music video on YouTube (duet)’. The groovy music video for the song stands at over 8 billion views worldwide.
When Jennifer Aniston broke the internet and a Guinness World Record
Many of the biggest stars from the 90s have for whatever reason, delayed the commencement of their Instagram journeys. Take Jennifer for instance. Jennifer made her Insta debut in October 2019 with a blurry selfie featuring all her Friends castmates. The post earned her a Guinness World Record collecting a million followers in just 5 hours and 16 minutes.
X is a different ballgame all together
The most-followed X account is that of Elon Musk and it has been so for a while. Elon and his whacky posts have garnered an audience of 195 million followers. Next in line, is former POTUS Barack Obama at almost 132 million followers. Ronaldo reigns strong here as well, coming in third at over a 112 million followers. This makes Justin Bieber and Rihanna, the most-followed showbiz public figures on the platform, with 110 and 108 million followers respectively. These numbers are no mean feat.
It is worth mentioning here, that the internet is not really all that frivolous. The most liked X post of all-time is that announcing the passing of beloved actor Chadwick Boseman. The post was made by his family in August 2020 and has garnered over 6 million likes, the highest on the platform.
Special mention: The Ellen DeGeneres Oscars selfie
This was a moment in time and will probably make it to history books in the future. Or not. But it’s still as iconic as the day back in 2014 when Ellen posted it. The star-studded selfie featured Ellen front and centre with Bradley Cooper wielding the camera flanked by Meryl Streep, Jared Leto, Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts, Jennifer Lawrence, Kevin Spacey, Lupita Nyong’o and Channing Tatum. The photo was reshared so many times that X which was Twitter back then, quite literally crashed.
Which of these pop culture moments are fresh in your memory?
