2016's most brag-worthy destinations & hotels according to Instagram
Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package. New York City, Disney theme parks and the MGM Grand Las Vegas hotel are the most brag-worthy places on Instagram, according to the photo sharing site's end-of-the-year ranking of the most Instagrammed destinations of 2016.
When it comes to snapping selfies and proudly announcing their whereabouts and travels, Instagrammers were the most active in New York over the last year, freeze-framing the striking skyline, their favorite pizzeria or landmarks like the Brooklyn Bridge and Rockefeller Center on the photo-sharing site.
The same can be said of London and Moscow, which round out the top three most geo-tagged cities in the world, with selfie snappers posing against iconic landmarks and sharing photos of their favorite restaurants with fellow Insta users.
For the travel-related rankings, analysts looked at the top geo-tags in different categories including city, hotel and location. Instagram counts more than 500 million active users.
The most Instagrammable hotel, meanwhile, is the MGM Grand Las Vegas, which topped the ranking for hotels, followed by the W New York in Times Square and The Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas.
In fact, the list of the world's top 10 most Instagrammed hotels is dominated by casino resorts, be they in Las Vegas or Macau.
With their colorful parade of life-sized cartoon characters and make-believe worlds, Disney and Universal Studios theme parks emerged the most popular locations for capturing Instagram moments, followed by Central Park in New York, Times Square and the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
The folks at Instagram also compiled a list of the most popular celebrity vacation snaps of the year, with Chrissy Teigen and John Legend out-Instagramming the rest of the glitteratti for their poolside photo, post-baby Luna.
Rounding out the top three spots for celebrity vacation photos are Britney Spears and Elsa Pataky.
And when it comes to boosting the color and cleaning up shaky Instagram shot, the most popular filter of 2016 was Clarendon, followed by Gingham and Juno.
THE TOP INSTAGRAM TRENDS FOR TRAVEL IN 2016:
Most Geotagged Cities (Global)
1) New York, New York, USA
2) London, United Kingdom
3) Moscow, Russia
4) São Paulo, Brazil
5) Paris, France
6) Los Angeles, California, USA
7) Saint Petersburg, Russia
8) Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
9) Istanbul, Turkey
10) Jakarta, Indonesia
Most Instagrammed Hotels in the World 2016
1) MGM Grand Las Vegas
2) W New York - Times Square
3) The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas
4) Atlantis The Palm, Dubai
5) Caesars Palace (Las Vegas)
6) Paris Las Vegas Hotel & Casino
7) Fontainebleau Miami Beach
8) Wynn Las Vegas
9) Ushuaïa Ibiza Beach Hotel (Official)
10) The Venetian Macao
Most-Instagrammed Locations of 2016 (based on global geotag data)
1) Disney Theme Parks (global)
2) Universal Studios Theme Parks (global)
3) Central Park (NYC)
4) Times Square (NYC)
5) Eiffel Tower (Paris)
6) Louvre Museum (Paris)
7) Las Vegas Strip (Las Vegas)
8) Santa Monica Pier (LA)
9) Brooklyn Bridge (NYC)
10) ВДНХ / Vystavka Dostizheniy Narodnogo Khozyaystva (Moscow)
Top Travel Hashtags 2016
1) #travel
2) #sunset
3) #travelgram
4) #wanderlust
5) #vacation
6) #instatravel
7) #adventure
8) #view
9) #travelphotography
10) #roadtrip
Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package.