3 min readNew DelhiUpdated: Jan 30, 2026 09:18 AM IST
In the world of social media and Instagram, Indian cricketer Virat Kohli has managed to amass a following which can hardly be matched by anyone. The batsman has over 274 million followers, making him one of the most popular celebrities on the platform. That’s precisely why the whole internet went into a frenzy when his account temporarily disappeared on Friday morning. Virat’s fans were quick to panic, and wondered whether it was just a glitch. Like any other crisis with the cricketer, they went straight to his wife, actor Anushka Sharma’s account, to enquire.
The moment Virat’s account went off the grid, his fans feared the worst. Many commented on his fan pages that, “You have already retired from T20 and Test cricket. Why retire from here? We just have one heart; how many times will you break it?” When no answer or explanation came from that avenue, the fans jumped straight to Anushka’s account and flooded the comments section of her latest post.
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One fan wrote, “Bhabhi, bhaiya kaha hai (Sister-in-law, where is our brother)?” Some asked whether Anushka knew where Virat’s phone was or if she knew what he had done with his account. The others implored the actor to bring back her husband’s account. However, the clamour soon calmed down when people realised that Virat’s page was visible again. Just like it disappeared, the page came back on the platform without any explanation. This led to his fans expressing their happiness on his last post.
The comment section of Virat Kohli’s last post. (Photo: Instagram/Virat Kohli)
Comments like “The king is back” and “Finally you are back” started flowing in. One user wrote, “Aaj toh dara hi diya tha aapne (You really scared us today). ” With his current following, Virat sits at the third spot in the list of the most followed sportspersons in the world, only behind Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. When compared to Bollywood, Kohli’s 274 million followers stand tall in front of Shah Rukh Khan (49.2 million), Salman Khan (72.5 million), Amitabh Bachchan (37.4 million) and Katrina Kaif (80.2 million).
In 2025, Virat had another incident with Instagram when he liked actor Avneet Kaur’s photo, and later claimed that this was a glitch from the app. He said, “I’d like to clarify that while clearing my feed, it appears the algorithm may have mistakenly registered an interaction. There was absolutely no intent behind it. I request that no unnecessary assumptions be made. Thank you for your understanding.”
