Online Reporter
NEW YORK.—Meta has announced that a collaborative Instagram post from pop star Taylor Swift and NFL star Travis Kelce shattered platform engagement records after the celebrity duo announced their engagement.
The duo announced on social media:
“Your English teacher and your gym teacher are getting married,” they captioned the post. The post amassed one million reposts in under six hours and more than 14 million likes in the first hour. The joint post announcing the couple’s engagement is now among the most-shared in Instagram’s history, according to the company.
The event proves Swift’s unmatched cultural influence, Kelce’s crossover appeal beyond sports and Meta’s push to make both Instagram and Threads central hubs for real-time cultural moments.
Meta noted Swift’s name quickly hit the top of trending topics on its new Threads app after the announcement.
The move comes as a win for Meta as it battles with X (formerly Twitter) for real-time cultural moments.
Swift has a history of breaking the internet. Her 2022 album “Midnights” broke Sportify’s single day streaming record, becoming the most-streamed album globally in a 24-hour period and her recent Eras Tour grossed over US$2 billion.
Kelce’s NFL profile has been turbocharged by the “Swift effect.”
When Swift attended his Kansas City Chiefs games last season, Kelce’s jersey sales jumped and NFL TV ratings saw a bump.
Fans and fellow celebrities flooded Threads and X with posts celebrating the news.Social media analysts say such viral moments can benefit Meta by driving user engagement that advertisers and investors value.
Swift and Kelce recently set a Guinness World Record for “most concurrent podcast views” during her appearance on Kelce’s New Heights podcast and Swift’s teaser post promoting it generayed 4,5 million likes and a staggering 145% engagement rate. Fans online exclaimed their excitement and clamoured to learn more about the ring.
What kind of ring is it?
Kelce proposed with a cushion brilliant-cut diamond, according to jeweler Avi Bulow. “It’s a long, elongated cushion cut, cushion brilliant, which makes it a more rare stone and very desired,” said Bulow, who sold Kelce a watch when he first entered the NFL.
Bulow said it’s hard to precisely determine the diamond’s cut and clarity from the pictures the couple posted.
He guesses it has an E colour — the second-highest colour rating for a diamond behind a D rating.
“It’s hard on a stone like that to get a D colour, but it’s possible he did pull it off,” he said.Bulow said the clarity of the diamond appears to be VVS grade — a rating clarity just below flawless.
How much did it cost?
Without Kelce confirming the price he paid, there’s no way to know for certain the value of the ring, but Bulow said that it appears to be an eight-carat diamond that could be worth US$1 million to US$1.2 million.Bulow said after Selena Gomez became engaged to Benny Blanco with a marquise-cut diamond, he got more requests for that style of diamond.
“That’s going to be the hottest stone in the market, no question,” he said.
Swift and Kelse’s engagement has sparked reactions from around the world, with US President Donald Trump, Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex and the Prince and Princess of Wales among those responding to the news.
The Duchess of Sussex and the official Instagram account for the Prince and Princess of Wales were among those who “liked” the post.
President Trump said:
“Well, I wish them a lot of luck,” he told reporters. “I think it’s, I think he’s a great player, I think he’s a great guy and I think that she’s a terrific person. So I wish them a lot of luck.”
The news comes not long after Swift announced the impending release of her next album, The Life Of A Showgirl, which is widely expected to be heavily inspired by her romance with Kelce.
Taylor Swift’s future brother-in-law Jason Kelce celebrated the engagement news. He congratulated his brother Travis and Swift.
During the latest episode of the “New Heights” podcast released on Wednesday, the former NFL star addressed the “gigantic piece of news that just hit the waves”.
He said the team at “New Heights” wanted to send the celebrity couple a “giant congratulations on being engaged”, erupting into cheers as he dubbed the moment the “proposal heard around the world”. —Agencies
