The most Instagrammed spot in South Africa

 ·10 May 2017

Online travel group, TravelBird, has released a list of the most Instagrammed tourist destinations in the world – with only one South African spot making it into the list of the top 500.

The list was determined by using popular photo-sharing app, Instagram’s API, and sniffing out which locations drew the most hashtags in the local language, as well as translations into English and other languages.

According to TravelBird, phrases and tag-lines associated with specific tourist destinations were also included (such as #TheHappiestPlaceOnEarth for Disneyland), but common terms were excluded (such as #Disney, which is related, but not specifically about Disneyland.

South Africa’s most popular tourist destination is the Kruger National Park, according to the rankings – which ranked 49th in the world with 410,763 tags, above Cedar Point, Ohio USA, and just below Anfield, in North West England.

The Kruger Park is the most well-known game reserve in South Africa, and one of the largest national parks in Africa.

While the Kruger Park is the only destination pulled from the Instagram API by TravelBird, it is worth noting that Instagram’s live data shows that #CapeTown remains one of the most tagged destinations, with over 5 million tags.

Because of its broad use (it is a city), it likely did not qualify – however, a well-known tourist destination linked to the city, #TableMountain, has over 500,000 tags, which would place it above the Kruger Park in the rankings.

TravelBird said that its Instagram barometer was a good indication of places where ‘millenials’ are travelling to, with half of the top 10 destinations in the world being in the USA.

Disneyland in California is the top-tagged destination in the world by some margin, with 14.6 million tags on the site – more than double the tags in the second-best destination, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, with 7.2 million tags.

Disney World in Florida USA ranked as the third most popular destination, followed by the South Beach in the same state, and the Berlin Wall in Germany completing the top 5.

Below is a list of the top 15 tourist destinations in the world by Instagram tags – you can find the full list here.

# Attraction Region Country Tags
1 Disneyland California USA 14 615 952
2 Eiffel Tower Parisian Region France 7 253 011
3 Walt Disney World Florida USA 5 465 098
4 South Beach Florida USA 4 689 396
5 Berlin Wall Berlin Germany 4 595 501
6 Las Vegas Strip Nevada USA 3 653 548
7 Big Ben Greater London UK 2 561 617
8 Times Square New York USA 2 560 272
9 Notre Dame Parisian Region France 2 517 129
10 Oktoberfest Bavaria Germany 2 262 885
11 Mardi Gras Louisiana USA 2 202 256
12 Niagara Falls Ontario Canada 2 198 459
13 Valle Sagrado (Machu Picchu) Cusco Peru 2 195 108
14 Grand Canyon Arizona USA 1 989 316
15 Waikiki Hawaii USA 1 939 768

Read: Could tourism be the new mining boom for SA?

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