Alex Pereira Has Gained 311k Followers Since UFC 303

Key Highlights:

• Alex Pereira gained the most Instagram followers after his title defense at UFC 303 with 311,122
• Payton Talbott gained a whopping 51.28% of his new followers after his 19-second knockout at UFC 303
• Carlos Hernandez gained the least amount of followers as he gained just 114

The UFC headed back to the fight capital for a jam-packed International Fight Week where all fight fans flock to Las Vegas to check out the week of UFC festivities and of course head over to the T-Mobile Arena to see the stacked UFC 303 event that delivered. In the main event, we saw the reigning and defending UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Alex Pereira retain his title for a second time when blasted Jiri Prochazka into another dimension with a second-round head kick knockout.

In the co-main event, it was supposed to be a featherweight fight between Brian Ortega and Diego Lopes but then the fight was agreed to be at lightweight after Ortega had a rough time trying to make the 146 lbs limit. Then hours before fight time Ortega fell ill and had to withdraw from the fight coming to save the day was Dan Ige who took the fight on a few hours’ notice at a catchweight of 165 lbs. While Ige did lose a unanimous decision he poured it on late in the 3rd round and put up a great fight against one of the hottest prospects in the UFC.

The rest of this card was littered with great fights like Andre Fili vs. Cub Swanson, and then you have the jaw-dropping knockouts by Joe Pyfer, Jean Silva, and Payton Talbott. All in all, it was a fantastic event that had many UFC fans, old and new, on the edge of their seats. As the dust settles after a big PPV like UFC 303, many fighters get an influx of new fans or potentially lose fans in some cases. We looked over the fighters at UFC 303 and analyzed the data to see who had gained the most Instagram followers after their fight at UFC 303.

This graph shows that Alex Pereira gained the most Instagram followers from before the fight until the day after the fight where he gained 101,559 followers. Coming behind him with more than 50% fewer followers was Ian Garry. You can check out the full list of followers gained for each fighter below:

Fighter Instagram Followers Day Before UFC 303 Instagram Followers Day After UFC 303 Instagram Followers Gained Day After UFC 303 Percentage Gained

Alex Pereira 3,817,625 3,919,184 101,559 2.66%

Ian Machado Garry 532,257 569,712 37,455 7.04%

Payton Talbott 74,140 96,038 21,898 29.54%

Diego Lopes 315,946 334,877 18,931 5.99%

Jiří Procházka 897,870 911,799 13,929 1.55%

Michael Page 846,308 857,637 11,329 1.34%

Dan Ige 110,012 117,463 7,451 6.77%

M. Waterson-Gomez 1,637,389 1,643,692 6,303 0.38%

Jean Silva 45,331 49,863 4,532 10.00%

Rei Tsuruya 10,654 14,907 4,253 39.92%

Brian Ortega 1,028,622 1,031,951 3,329 0.32%

Joe Pyfer 102,049 104,463 2,414 2.37%

Cub Swanson 367,044 369,227 2,183 0.59%

Vinicius Oliveira 39,600 41,704 2,104 5.31%

Andre Fili 155,710 156,957 1,247 0.80%

Roman Dolidze 132,016 133,248 1,232 0.93%

Macy Chiasson 18,278 19,464 1,186 6.49%

Yanis Ghemmouri 30,493 31,678 1,185 3.89%

Mayra Bueno Silva 80,433 81,577 1,144 1.42%

Anthony Smith 265,322 265,924 602 0.23%

Ricky Simón 50,372 50,836 464 0.92%

Martin Buday 20,925 21,330 405 1.94%

Charles Jourdain 104,290 104,614 324 0.31%

Andrei Arlovski 451,412 451,564 152 0.03%

Marc-André Barriault 21,294 21,420 126 0.59%

Carlos Hernandez 6,434 6,537 103 1.60%

Gillian Robertson 131,629 131,704 75 0.06%

The popularity of these fighters comes and goes in the blink of an eye which is why the UFC tells the fighters that they need to be on social media to market themselves. Without social media, it’s hard for the newer fans to know about you since most fighters are fighting up to 3 times a year barring any injuries. Since it’s been just a couple of days since UFC 303, let’s take a look at the current state of the growth of their followers since the PPV.

This graph shows that Alex Pereira still continued to gain followers even more than just a day after the event happened. He has gained the most followers since the day before UFC 303 with 311,122. Coming in second is still Ian Garry who’s gained 46,195. Shockingly one fighter, Rei Tsuruya gained 51.64% of his Instagram fighters after fighting at UFC 303. Payton Talbott also grew his Instagram following by 51.28% following his 19-second knockout win. Check out the full list of followers gained or lost for the fighters at UFC 302.

Fighter Instagram Followers Day Before UFC 303 Current Instagram Followers 7/1/24 Instagram Followers Gained 7/1/24 Percentage Gained

Alex Pereira 3,817,625 4,128,747 311,122 8.15%

Ian Machado Garry 532,257 578,452 46,195 8.68%

Payton Talbott 74,140 112,159 38,019 51.28%

Diego Lopes 315,946 349,850 33,904 10.73%

Jiří Procházka 897,870 930,511 32,641 3.64%

Michael Page 846,308 860,092 13,784 1.63%

Dan Ige 110,012 130,571 20,559 18.69%

M. Waterson-Gomez 1,637,389 1,644,573 7,184 0.44%

Jean Silva 45,331 51,559 6,228 13.74%

Rei Tsuruya 10,654 16,156 5,502 51.64%

Brian Ortega 1,028,622 1,032,674 4,052 0.39%

Joe Pyfer 102,049 105,180 3,131 3.07%

Cub Swanson 367,044 369,669 2,625 0.72%

Vinicius Oliveira 39,600 42,477 2,877 7.27%

Andre Fili 155,710 157,417 1,707 1.10%

Roman Dolidze 132,016 133,701 1,685 1.28%

Macy Chiasson 18,278 19,855 1,577 8.63%

Yanis Ghemmouri 30,493 32,135 1,642 5.38%

Mayra Bueno Silva 80,433 82,354 1,921 2.39%

Anthony Smith 265,322 265,924 602 0.23%

Ricky Simón 50,372 50,971 599 1.19%

Martin Buday 20,925 21,457 532 2.54%

Charles Jourdain 104,290 104,632 342 0.33%

Andrei Arlovski 451,412 451,649 237 0.05%

Marc-André Barriault 21,294 21,432 138 0.65%

Carlos Hernandez 6,434 6,548 114 1.77%

Gillian Robertson 131,629 133,450 1,821 1.38%

In the UFC, there is only so much promotion they can do for the fighter so it is up to the fighter to have a presence on social media. That helps the fighters with endorsements, investments, and bigger fighting opportunities as well. This is just a small sample of what fighting under the bright lights inside the Octagon can do to one’s popularity and it shows that Alex Pereira continues to grow as one of the sport’s biggest stars.