Who Are The Biggest Social Media Winners In F1 So Far This Year?

F1’s increasing popularity all around the world has seen the social media profiles of drivers and other figures associated with the sport get a sizable boost. With the Drive To Survive Season 5 and the 2023 F1 season up and running, we tallied the numbers to see which drivers in the current grid have gained the most followers on Instagram.

We looked at the number of followers on different days to also ascertain if and which drivers got a spike in followers after the release of DTS, the Bahrain GP and the Saudi Arabian GP. We started our analysis on February 21, 2023 and our latest update was on March 20, 2023. Here’s what we found.

Drivers that gained the most followers

Instagram Followers for F1 Drivers

Team	Driver Name	Followers on 2023-02-21	Followers on 2023-02-27	Followers on 2023-03-09	Followers on 2023-03-13	Followers Percentage Increase(Feb 21 vs March 13)
Williams	Logan Sargeant	225,471	234,632	269,553	273,183	21
McLaren	Oscar Piastri	629,123	651,779	692,097	696,192	11
AlphaTauri	Nyck de Vries	714,902	726,290	765,002	768,563	8
Aston Martin	Lance Stroll	868,718	876,016	925,677	932,553	7
Alfa Romeo	Zhou Guanyu	775,205	782,392	805,452	808,666	4
Haas	Nico Hülkenberg	1,400,797	1,410,886	1,452,752	1,458,815	4
AlphaTauri	Yuki Tsunoda	1,390,972	1,402,392	1,434,322	1,439,502	3
Haas	Kevin Magnussen	1,094,308	1,102,605	1,124,058	1,127,471	3
Aston Martin	Sebastian Vettel	2,651,816	2,666,354	2,702,469	2,716,417	2
Alpine	Esteban Ocon	1,780,254	1,790,166	1,818,815	1,823,419	2
Ferrari	Carlos Sainz	6,271,145	6,307,928	6,400,288	6,420,256	2
Ferrari	Charles Leclerc	9,974,204	10,030,008	10,172,766	10,203,728	2
Alpine	Pierre Gasly	3,810,922	3,829,668	3,881,468	3,890,855	2
Mercedes	George Russell	4,071,258	4,091,798	4,144,468	4,152,600	2
Red Bull	Sergio Perez	5,383,256	5,405,873	5,465,268	5,478,089	2
Williams	Alex Albon	1,872,337	1,879,377	1,898,682	1,902,325	2
Alfa Romeo	Valtteri Bottas	3,653,073	3,664,600	3,687,098	3,696,738	1
Red Bull	Max Verstappen	9,489,920	9,510,642	9,587,747	9,600,844	1
McLaren	Lando Norris	5,988,697	6,004,709	6,040,259	6,046,626	1
AlphaTauri	AlphaTauri	2,634,138	2,640,891	2,657,077	2,659,302	1
Mercedes	Lewis Hamilton	31,549,420	31,649,547	31,791,819	31,833,143	1
Aston Martin	Fernando Alonso	4,995,298	4,995,298	5,270,527	5,303,473	6

After getting his first podium in two years, Fernando Alonso also ruled the social media charts among F1 drivers, gaining 419,342 followers.

Alonso’s old rival and seven-time World Champion, Lewis Hamilton, gained the second-most number of followers with 284,762. He was followed by the Ferrari pair of Charles LeClerc (235,373 followers gained) and Carlos Sainz (147,320 followers gained).

Reigning World Champion Max Verstappen lost out on first place to teammate Sergio Perez in Jeddah and he’s also behind him in these standings.

Drivers with the highest percentage gain of followers

Percentage increase in followers

Team	Driver Name	Followers on 2023-02-21	Followers on 2023-02-27 (After DTS)	Followers on 2023-03-09 (After Bahrain GP)	Followers on 2023-03-13	Followers Percentage Increase(Feb 21 vs March 13)
Williams	Logan Sargeant	225,471	234,632	269,553	273,183	21
McLaren	Oscar Piastri	629,123	651,779	692,097	696,192	11
AlphaTauri	Nyck de Vries	714,902	726,290	765,002	768,563	8
Aston Martin	Lance Stroll	868,718	876,016	925,677	932,553	7
Aston Martin	Fernando Alonso	4,995,298	4,995,298	5,270,527	5,303,473	6
Alfa Romeo	Zhou Guanyu	775,205	782,392	805,452	808,666	4
Haas	Nico Hülkenberg	1,400,797	1,410,886	1,452,752	1,458,815	4
AlphaTauri	Yuki Tsunoda	1,390,972	1,402,392	1,434,322	1,439,502	3
Haas	Kevin Magnussen	1,094,308	1,102,605	1,124,058	1,127,471	3
Aston Martin	Sebastian Vettel	2,651,816	2,666,354	2,702,469	2,716,417	2
Alpine	Esteban Ocon	1,780,254	1,790,166	1,818,815	1,823,419	2
Ferrari	Carlos Sainz	6,271,145	6,307,928	6,400,288	6,420,256	2
Ferrari	Charles Leclerc	9,974,204	10,030,008	10,172,766	10,203,728	2
Alpine	Pierre Gasly	3,810,922	3,829,668	3,881,468	3,890,855	2
Mercedes	George Russell	4,071,258	4,091,798	4,144,468	4,152,600	2
Red Bull	Sergio Perez	5,383,256	5,405,873	5,465,268	5,478,089	2
Williams	Alex Albon	1,872,337	1,879,377	1,898,682	1,902,325	2
Alfa Romeo	Valtteri Bottas	3,653,073	3,664,600	3,687,098	3,696,738	1
Red Bull	Max Verstappen	9,489,920	9,510,642	9,587,747	9,600,844	1
McLaren	Lando Norris	5,988,697	6,004,709	6,040,259	6,046,626	1
AlphaTauri	AlphaTauri	2,634,138	2,640,891	2,657,077	2,659,302	1
Mercedes	Lewis Hamilton	31,549,420	31,649,547	31,791,819	31,833,143	1

When it comes to drivers who had the highest percentage gain for followers, rookie driver Logan Sargeant tops the list.

His Instagram followers increased from 234,632 to 279,084 – an 18.932 percent increase.

The second ranking driver in this metric is Fernando Alonso, who gained over 8.39 percent more followers with two successive podiums. Closely following him is Oscar Piastri who’s gained about 8.3 percent more followers.

Lando Norris and McLaren’s fortunes have also dwindled on Instagram as the British driver has the lowest follower percentage gain with 0.88 percent more followers.

The Drive To Survive and Bahrain GP Effect

We also looked at follower numbers a few days after the release of Drive to Survive Season 5 and the Bahrain GP to see spikes and Alonso was the beneficiary here as well.

The Spaniard gained 275,229 followers between February 27 and March 9. He took centre-stage in DTS as it featured his move to Aston Martin and then of course, had an emotional return to the podium in Sakhir.

Charles LeClerc was the second highest gainer followed by Lewis Hamilton. Among the rookies, it was Oscar Piastri who topped the charts, especially considering he was also the main subject of the episode that focused on his controversial move to ditch Alpine and move to McLaren.