Who Has the Most Followers on Twitter?

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Jul 17, 6:55AM EDT

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Who Has the Most Followers on Twitter? — © Bill Pugliano / Getty Images

Twitter Inc. (NYSE: TWTR) suffered what may be an irreparable blow to its image as a hack compromised the accounts of several of America’s most visible people. This included Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Joe Biden. Reports say others targeted include Kim Kardashian West and Apple. Hackers who want to do the most damage likely aim at not only the famous but those who have the most followers.

The most followed person on Twitter is former president Barack Obama, according to Brandwatch, which puts the figure at 121 million. He is not only a perfect target because of his role in the public discourse over the presidential election. Any hacker’s message that uses his account reaches a huge number of followers.

After Obama are several celebrities on the Twitter most followed list: Justin Bieber (112 million followers), Katy Perry (108 million), Rihanna (97 million), Taylor Swift (86 million) and Cristiano Ronaldo (86 million). Donald J. Trump ranks seventh with 83 million followers. No one knows why he was not a target. Perhaps he has a layer of security others do not.

Kim Kardashian West has 65 million followers, which puts her in 12th place. She may be influential about beauty products and celebrities. Why was she hacked? Perhaps because the hack reached so many people.

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CNN Breaking News, with 58 million followers, was not targeted, although it sits in 16th position and reaches the public in real time. Twitter itself is in 17th place, with 58 million followers, which is something of an irony.

Another of those hacked was Bill Gates with 51 million followers, which puts him 22nd on the list. He remains influential, as the founder of Microsoft, and a huge supporter of the search for a cure of COVID-19. Another of those hacked was Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk, who ranks in 40th in Twitter followers at 40 million.

It has been reported that those attacks were part of a bitcoin scam. If so, the accounts chosen could hardly have been more visible.
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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.