Virat Kohli joins Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and Neymar on 100m Instagram followers

India cricket captain Virat Kohli has joined Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi and Neymar in an elite group of sports stars with over 100 million Instagram followers.

Kohli becomes the first Indian, the first Asian and the first cricketer to pass the milestone, which highlights the 32-year-old batsman’s enormous social media reach.

He will lead the India team as they aim to seal a series victory over England when the fourth and final Test gets underway in Ahmedabad on Thursday.

India cricket captain Virat Kohli has just surpassed 100 million followers on Instagram 

Kohli (left) shakes hands with England captain Joe Root during the ongoing Test series 

Kohli has become the first Indian, the first Asian and the first cricketer to surpass 100 million

The ICC congratulated Kohli on reaching the milestone with this social media post

Kohli marked reaching 100 million followers by writing: ‘You have made this journey beautiful. Feeling blessed and grateful for all the love. Thank you #Instafam.’

A good number of Kohli’s Instagram posts promote either his WROGN youth fashion label or the one8 collection of deodorant and aftershave, along with plenty of pictures of his cricket exploits.

In addition, Kohli has 40.8m followers on his Twitter account and 36m on Facebook.  

Kohli is certainly the most popular Indian on the photo-sharing website by some distance – Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra is next with 60m followers.

He also has more than double the followers of his wife, the actress Anushka Sharma. 

Kohli thanks his millions of followers after reaching the milestone on Wednesday 

Much of Kohli’s Instagram output is to promote his youth fashion label WROGN 

The one8 toiletries range is another brand frequently promoted by Kohli on Instagram

But Kohli still has a long way to go to match the 267m Instagram followers of Cristiano Ronaldo

Barcelona star Lionel Messi has a following of 187m on the picture-sharing website 

But he has a long way to go to catch up with some of the most popular sports stars on the platform.

Juventus and Portugal footballer Cristiano Ronaldo has a whopping 267m followers, more than any other person in the world and second only to the general Instagram account which has 387m.

Barcelona’s Messi has 187m while Neymar of Paris Saint-Germain has 147m.

Kohli does, however, outrank the world’s most followed football clubs – Real Madrid have 95.7m followers, while Barcelona aren’t far behind on 94.2m.

The NBA basketball star LeBron James boasts 80m followers on the site.

Only a select few have in excess of 200m followers on Instagram – Cristiano, the musician Ariana Grande, former wrestler turned actor Dwayne Johnson, reality TV star Kylie Jenner, singer Selena Gomez and TV personality Kim Kardashian.