Reels In Review 2022: Cricketer Virat Kohli and Musician Shubh Emerge As Top Trends In India

Meta-owned Instagram has a report highlighting the top trends seen on Instagram and Facebook in 2022, shining a light on Indian preferences on social media. As per the report titled ‘Reels In Review,’ Indians have shown an interest in a wide range of topics, ranging from sports to music and films. Cricketer Virat Kohli and musician Shubh emerged as particular favourites of social media users in India.

Data from the report revealed that more than 1 million Instagram reels related to the 20-20 World Cup, which took place in October-November, were created in India. In fact, the engagement with the tournament on Instagram reels created in India (comprising likes, comments, and shares) surpassed 2 billion.

Of the members of the Indian cricket team, Virat Kohli was one of the most popular hashtags used in the reels on the back of his stellar showing in the tournament, with Rohit Sharma and Hardik Pandya making up the rest of the top three most mentioned Indian cricketers in reels in India. However, the report also indicated a growing interest in newer faces like Suryakumar Yadav, who has made a real impact on the global stage this past year with swashbuckling performances.

Musician Shubh emerged as one of the stars of the scene, becoming one of the hashtags that saw the most increased usage as compared to data from 2021. Music was a real high point for India, with 15 of the top 20 most-used songs on Reels on Instagram worldwide being from Indian artists. These include songs like ‘Srivalli’ by Javed Ali and ‘Baarish Main Tum’ by Neha Kakkar, ‘Kesariya’ by Pritam, Arijit Singh and Amitabh Bhattacharya, ‘Gypsy’ by G.D. Kaur, the KGF 2 theme song, and ‘Jhoom’ by Ali Zafar. Songs like ‘Tumsa Koi Pyaara’ and original audio like ‘Kacha Badam’ also made it to the list.

The list of the most popular films and TV shows among content consumers in India were ‘Bhediya’, ‘Family Guy’, ‘Ek Villain Returns’, ‘Naagin 6’, ‘Vikram’, ‘Mismatched Season 2,’ and the upcoming ‘Pathaan’.

The annual report also highlighted the extensive use of augmented reality (AR) effects in Instagram reels by Indians, with some of the most-used AR effects being Enhance, All Soften, and Smoke Flare VR.