Islam Makhachev Has Gained 356k Followers Since UFC 302

Key Highlights:

• Islam Makhachev gained the most Instagram followers after his title defense at UFC 302 with 356,310
• Bassil Hafez gained a whopping 36.59% of his Instagram followers after his win against Mickey Gall at UFC 302
• Roman Kopylov was the only fighter to lose Instagram followers after a win at UFC 302

The UFC returned to the Prudential Center for a stacked PPV event on June 1st. The fight card was headlined by the reigning and defending UFC Lightweight Champion Islam Makhachev who successfully defended his lightweight title a record-tying third time when he submitted Dustin “The Diamond” Poirier in round 5.

Islam Makhachev defeats Dustin Poirier (2024)

📸 @CooperNeill pic.twitter.com/ZJvDgKJFJY

— Fight Pics That Go Hard (@fightpicsgohard) June 2, 2024

This main event fight was a back-and-forth affair between two of the best lightweights that the UFC has to offer. Many believed this would have been an easy title defense for Islam Makhachev but it was far from it. This wasn't the same Dustin Poirier that fought Makhachev's longtime training partner and now head coach Khabib Nurmagomedov as he was more well-equipped to defend the grappling than he was when he fought Nurmagomedov.

Ultimately even though Makhachev had to fight through adversity in this fight, he ultimately prevailed securing the 5th round submission over Poirier to retain the UFC lightweight title for a third time which ties him with his coach and training partner Khabib Nurmagomedov and BJ Penn for the most title defenses in the UFC history.

The rest of UFC 302 was littered with great fights and excitement throughout the event. There was a brutal arm break as Kevin Holland snapped Michal Oleksiejczuk's arm with a vicious armbar after he refused to tap.

Kevin Holland defeats Michal a Oleksiejczuk via Submission (Armbar) in the 1st at UFC 302

Kevin gave him a chance to tap, Michal refused, so he broke his arm. Nasty

If Herb is involved, an arm might get broken

(@StunnaXXL) pic.twitter.com/MWODxHvv9Q

— The Octagon Obsessed (@octagonobsessed) June 2, 2024

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 302, many fighters get an influx of new fans or potentially lose fans in some cases. We looked over the fighters at UFC 302 and analyzed the data to see who had gained the most followers after their fight at UFC 302.

In this graph below we see the followers each follower gained from the day before UFC 302 and the day after the event concluded:

This graph shows that Islam Makhachev gained the most Instagram followers from before the fight until after the fight where he gained 103,327 followers. Coming behind him almost 50% less followers was his opposition Dustin Poirier. You can check out the full list of followers gained for each fighter below:

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 no injuries. Since it's been over a week since UFC 302, let's take a look at the current state of the growth of their followers since the PPV.

This graph shows that Islam Makhachev still continues to gain followers even though the event happened over a week ago. He has gained the most followers since the day before UFC 302 with 356,310. Coming in second is still Dustin Poirier who's gained 208,782. Shockingly one fighter, Roman Kopylov, lost 5,225 followers since the day before UFC 302. Check out the full list of followers gained or lost for the fighters at UFC 302.

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.