Travel influencers on Instagram: 39 creators with measured engagement (2026)

This is a list of 39 travel influencers on Instagram, grouped by size, with numbers we measured ourselves. For each one you get the follower count, the engagement rate of their typical post, how often they post, one recent post and a note on which brands they suit. We picked them from 2,230 travel creators that Virev's crawler read between July 1 and October 2, 2026, and opened every profile by hand on October 2.

The pages that rank for "travel influencers" list famous names. Feedspot's top 100 US travel influencers starts with accounts of 1.3 to 3.2 million followers and gives no engagement numbers. CreatorDB's top 20 is mostly YouTube channels with millions of subscribers. A hotel, tour operator or tourism board with a normal budget books creators with 1,000 to 100,000 followers and needs to know what a normal post gets. So 20 of the 39 creators here have fewer than 100,000 followers.

How to read the numbers

• Typical ER is likes plus comments on the creator's median post, divided by followers. We use the median post because one viral Reel can lift an average far above what a sponsored post will get. 14 creators below have an average more than twice their typical post.
• Posts/wk is the pace across their 12 most recent posts.
• Recent post links to a post close to their typical numbers, with its date and likes as we read them on Instagram on October 2. Instagram rounds counts above 10,000 to the nearest thousand.
• Followers come from Virev's last read of each account, between August 25 and September 30, 2026.

To check a travel account that is not on this list, paste the handle into the Instagram engagement rate calculator. It shows the average and the median-post rate side by side.

For context, the median travel creator's typical post ER is 3.35% for nano, 1.17% for micro, 0.77% for mid and 0.81% for macro accounts. 36 of the 39 creators below beat the median of their tier.

Nano travel influencers (1,000 to 10,000 followers)

• Cass (@mainelycass), Maine. Coastal Maine stays, taquerias, pumpkin patches and mountain rides, with trips to Switzerland, Albania and Mexico in her highlights. She also has 8,600 followers on TikTok. Fits Maine inns, restaurants and New England fall campaigns.
• Sailing SeaKat (@sailingseakat), UK. A family living on a sailboat with two small children, sailing from the UK toward the Mediterranean, with longer videos on YouTube. Fits sailing gear, family travel insurance and marinas.
• Sashank Varma (@sashankvarma), Dallas. A photographer and filmmaker who camps out of a built-out 4Runner with his dogs, often in the Tetons. His bio links a cooler brand. Fits overlanding gear, roof tents and dog travel products.
• Andrew and Jerumy (@howweseeeit), Chicago. A couple making short Midwest guides with a street address in every caption: antique malls, the Field of Dreams, Galena. Their bio says they have made content for more than fifteen Midwest travel boards. Fits small-town tourism boards and road trip brands in the Midwest.
• Mahmoud Saati (@brave.heart_photography), Montreal. Sunset and skyline Reels of Old Port Montreal shot on a Nikon D850 and a DJI drone, with French captions. Fits Montreal tourism, camera and drone brands.
• Marina Hoang (@marinaintoronto), Toronto. Cafes, restaurants and day trips around the Greater Toronto Area, with what she ordered listed in each caption. Fits GTA restaurants, cafes and Ontario small-town tourism.
• Go Wayfinder (@go.wayfinder), Thailand. Hotel and villa Reels from Thailand, Japan and the Maldives, such as COMO Point Yamu and Four Seasons Kyoto. Fits hotels and villas that want polished room footage more than reach.
• TwoGoWild (@twogowild.northwest), North West England. A parent filming days out with two young boys: farms, soft play, forests and shows. Typical post 4.21%, the lowest in this tier, at 4.4 posts a week. Invited visits are marked AD or INVITE. Fits family attractions in Lancashire and Merseyside.
• Manisha Mayekar (@yetanothertravelstory), Toronto. Toronto-area events, Niagara stays and festivals, 6.4 posts a week. One Reel lifts her average to 31.59%; her typical post is 9.92%. Fits Ontario hotels, events and South Asian community festivals.

Micro travel influencers (10,000 to 100,000 followers)

• Abbey (@abroadwithabbs), Perth and London. Budget adventure travel: an unguided three-week Annapurna Circuit trek, Western Australia day hikes and UK walks. Fits hiking gear, budget airlines and Western Australia tourism.
• Thuraya (@lenswithlatte), Lebanon. Mountain villages, cafes and stone houses in northern Lebanon, posted as short "postcards". Fits Lebanese tourism, guesthouses and cafes.
• Mica (@mayycca), San Diego. San Diego and Tijuana food finds and hidden gems, with 30,000 more followers on TikTok. Fits San Diego restaurants and cross-border day-trip offers.
• Dami (@eatwithdami), Miami. Miami food and night-out Reels, and cruise trips in her highlights. Two of her 2026 posts were sponsored, one of them a Marlins game day. Fits Miami restaurants, cruise lines and events.
• Alexander McHale (@ajmchaletravels), UK. Cosy UK stays, pubs and coastal towns in Dorset, Norfolk and Scotland, 4.3 posts a week. He follows only 68 accounts. Fits UK hotels, pubs and staycation brands.
• Emily Moore (@emilygoesplaces), Washington, DC. Weekend trips, hikes and hidden gems in Virginia, Pennsylvania and the Carolinas. Her typical post is 0.40%, the lowest on this list, yet 26 of her 2026 posts were paid, almost all by tourism boards (see the case below). Fits US destination marketing.
• Seth and Sofia Adventures (@seth_and_sofia), Midwest US. A family account with two children: theme parks, indoor play centers and toys. Four of the posts we read in 2026 were sponsored, for Costco, a toy maker and others. Fits family attractions and toy brands more than long-haul travel.
• Manmeet Shah (@nomadicmanmeet), Melbourne. Victoria road trips, regional stays and itineraries, and an ambassador for Wild Earth Australia. 12 of his 2026 posts were sponsored (see the case below). Fits Australian regional tourism.
• Chase Vondran (@explorewithchase), Chicago. LGBTQ+ travel guides to US cities and small towns. Has posted for Visit Pennsylvania and Visit Pittsburgh, and the example post, an Airbnb partner trip, got 645 comments. Fits destinations and stays that want a queer audience.
• Serena Ketcham (@serenanoriiko), US. Climbing, skiing and camping, plus the restoration of a 1986 Toyota pickup. Posts less than once a week. Fits outdoor and truck gear, such as the rack and suspension brands she tags.
• Kate Rowley (@katerowleyadventures), UK. "Fairytale" road trips through Scotland and Ireland with castles and moody weather, 8.5 posts a week, the highest pace on this list. Typical post 7.62% on 97,284 followers. Fits UK and Irish tourism boards and car rental.

Mid-tier travel influencers (100,000 to 500,000 followers)

• Virginia Adventure Family (@virginia.adventure.family), Virginia. Zoë and her four children try playgrounds, resorts and events around DC. 48 of the 98 posts we read from 2026 were sponsored, including seven that tag Sheetz and five that tag Kalahari Resorts. The typical post is 0.73%. Price this account per sponsored post, and check it has room for one more brand.
• Francesca Cipolla (@pistachioinlondon), London. A Sicilian food creator: London restaurants and food guides to Sicily. Fits restaurants, Italian food brands and Sicily tourism.
• Alex Kittoe (@alexkittoephotos), Kansas City. Film photographs of the American West, Japan, Italy and Kenya, and a photo book. 5.5 posts a week. Fits camera, film lab and national park campaigns.
• Aleah and Seth (@happilyeverexploring), Washington, DC. A couple posting hikes, cabins and rooftop-tent trips within driving distance of DC. One viral Reel lifts their average to 5.79%; the typical post is 1.90%. Fits cabin rentals, Virginia and Pennsylvania tourism, and outdoor gear.
• Two Mates 1 Chair (@twomates1chair), Australia. Two friends, Fletch and Lachie, who travel the world with one wheelchair and a piggyback (#piggybacktheworld). Their three 2026 sponsored posts, including Qantas, got 1.69 times their usual response. Fits airlines, accessible travel and causes.
• Lana Hartley (@storky_adventures), Devon and Cornwall. Van life, caravan holidays and beaches in South West England. 12 of her 2026 posts were ads, for caravan parks, cottages, portable power stations and drones, at 0.44 times her usual post. Fits UK holiday parks; plan for the lower ad figure.
• Elena Joyce (@elenaajoyce), New York. Cozy New York, upstate and Japan, with "comment link" prompts for her guides. 5.5 posts a week and a 4.93% typical post. Fits hotels, cabins and fall campaigns in the Northeast.
• Christine Diaz (@carryonchristine), US. Luxury and LGBTQ+ travel, Pride events and Greek islands. One Reel lifts her average to 8.99%; her typical post is 1.43%, the largest gap on this list. Fits airlines and Pride-season destination campaigns.
• Bea and Steffen Zaiser (@thezaisers), Australia and Germany. A couple filming luxury hotels and resorts, with bilingual captions. Fits luxury hotels that want room and pool footage.
• Ady (@verbalgold), Atlanta. Hotel reviews and family trips, plus her son's baseball. 11 of her 2026 posts were sponsored, for Delta, American Express, a Ritz-Carlton and others, at 1.04 times her usual post. Fits hotels and family travel brands.
• Augie (@austinaugie). A documentary photographer on long trips through China, Kyrgyzstan and Laos with a friend. One post lifts his average to 19.38%; the typical post is 5.57%. Fits camera and film brands.
• KhayJ (@_khayj). Slow travel through Asia, filmed as street meetings with locals. 15 sponsored posts in 2026, including Insta360 and Japan Airlines, got 0.33 times a usual post. Fits airlines and gear; price on the ad figure.

Macro travel influencers (500,000+ followers)

• Aviral Gupta (@aviralmgupta), India. Luxury hotel stays in India and Southeast Asia, posted about once every two weeks. The example post is a perfume Reel. Fits Indian luxury hotels and lifestyle brands.
• Kilian Bron (@kilianbron), Andorra. A mountain bike rider filming rides through India, Jordan and the Alps, with his own films. Fits outdoor, bike and adventure tourism brands.
• Sam Chui (@samchui). Aviation: airport and cabin tours, aircraft comparisons and inaugural flights. Fits airlines, airports and aviation brands.
• Sam Youkilis (@samyoukilis), Italy. Photographs and phone videos of Italian streets and food, with commissions for Belmond hotels. Typical post 5.07% at nearly a million followers. Fits luxury hotels and Italian food brands.
• Baluja Carbo Lazaro (@rey1king), Switzerland. Swiss Alps hikes, Red Sea and Zanzibar diving, and hotel visits, numbered as hotel highlights in his profile. Fits Swiss tourism, dive resorts and hotels.
• Luke Stackpoole (@withluke), London. Landscape and wildlife photography from Iceland, Greenland and Antarctica, plus Lightroom presets. Typical post 0.65%. Fits camera, lens and editing software brands, as he already posts for Tamron and DJI.
• Prem Vats (@premvats), India. Travel and dance Reels from Africa and Asia, and a YouTube channel with over a million subscribers. Typical post 9.33%, the highest in this tier. Fits safari lodges and tour operators that want Indian audiences.

Travel creators against all creators

We compared the 2,230 travel creators with the 53,934 individual creators in our Instagram engagement rate benchmarks. Both groups use the same rule: likes plus comments, averaged over the 12 most recent posts, divided by followers.

Travel creators get about the same response as other creators up to 500,000 followers. The one gap is at 10,000 to 100,000 followers, where the median travel creator gets 2.13% against 2.45%. Above 500,000 the travel median is higher, 1.24% against 0.92%.

The bigger difference is paid work. 14.4% of travel creators had an Instagram paid partnership label in their last 12 posts, against 6.6% of all creators. At 10,000 to 100,000 followers the figures are 18.5% and 8.0%. Many travel creators earn from hosted stays and tourism board campaigns, so ask what each one has booked for the coming months before you send dates.

Travel sub-niches: family travel gets half, photographers get more

"Travel" covers very different accounts. We split the 2,230 creators by their Virev niche into eight groups and compared each creator's typical post with all creators of the same follower tier. 1.00x means the same as the all-creator median for that size.

• Family travel accounts take the most deals and get the lowest response. The median family travel creator's typical post gets half of what a creator of the same size gets, and 26% of them had a paid label in their last 12 posts. Virginia Adventure Family on this list had 48 sponsored posts out of 98 this year.
• Photographers and hikers get more and sell less. Travel photography accounts beat same-size creators by 26% and only 8% carry a paid label. Outdoor and adventure accounts beat them by 13%, but their sponsored posts drop the most, to 0.68x.
• Luxury hotel accounts are bigger. Their median creator has about 48,700 followers, more than twice the travel median of about 17,500, and 20% run paid deals.

The smaller groups have 64 to 153 creators, so read their figures as rough.

Travel ad posts hold up better than most

We found 3,309 sponsored posts on 663 travel creator accounts, posted between January 1 and September 25, 2026. We used the same rules as our sponsored post study: a sponsored post has Instagram's paid partnership label, an #ad or #sponsored tag, or a PR tag, and we compare its likes and comments with the median of the same creator's posts without any ad, gift, code or giveaway sign. The median travel ad post got 0.78 times the creator's usual response, against 0.69 times across all creators in that study. 63% of travel ad posts still got less than usual.

The gap comes from micro creators. Travel ad posts got 0.90 times the usual response at nano size, 0.84 at micro, 0.63 at mid and 0.55 at macro. The all-creator study found 0.91, 0.74, 0.60 and 0.52. Posts with a gift tag got 0.83 times, posts with a discount code or affiliate link 0.83, and giveaways 1.87.

Who pays matters more than the label:

• Tourism boards got a normal post. 107 posts tagging a tourism board, such as Visit Pennsylvania or Visit Williamsburg, got 1.05 times the usual response. Hotels and stays got 0.92 and tours and booking sites 0.84. A destination post is the content the audience followed the creator for.
• Travel gear got about half. eSIM ads (Airalo, Holafly, Jetpac and others, 36 posts on 26 accounts) got 0.56 times the usual response, and luggage and bag ads 0.55. Camera and gadget ads got 0.63.
• Many hosted trips carry no ad tag. 518 posts on 189 accounts say "hosted" or "press trip" in the caption without any ad label or tag. We counted them as normal posts. They got 0.97 times the usual response. If your brand hosts a creator, agree how the post will be labeled.

If a travel creator's typical post gets 2,000 likes and comments, plan for about 2,000 on a tourism board post and about 1,100 on an eSIM or luggage post.

Case: Emily Goes Places and the US tourism boards

Emily Moore (@emilygoesplaces, 47,899 followers) lives in Washington, DC and posts weekend trips, hikes and hidden gems within a few hours' drive. Her typical post gets 190 likes and comments, an engagement rate of 0.40%, the lowest on this list. Tourism boards book her anyway. Between January 1 and September 19, 2026, 26 of her 106 posts were sponsored. On October 2 we re-read the likes and comments on all 106 posts on Instagram.

What the posts show:

• Destination posts beat her normal posts. Her 21 posts paid by destinations, tourism boards and historic sites got a median of 289 likes and comments, 1.52 times her usual 190. 14 of the 21 beat it.
• Other brands did not. Her 5 posts for WordPress, a Broadway show and a deli got a median of 137, 0.72 times her usual post. Only one beat it.
• Boards booked her in pairs. Visit Wilmington, Visit Franklin, Visit Williamsburg, the Susquehanna River Valley and Visit Fairfax each bought two posts. Visit Fairfax's second post, on July 27, got 1,313 likes and comments, seven times her usual post.
• Her best paid post was a stay. An August 21 post on Gwynn's Island, Virginia, with a stay at a new guest house, got 2,681 likes and comments.

The same pattern shows on the other side of the world. Manmeet Shah (@nomadicmanmeet, 61,199 followers) posted seven sponsored posts about the Great Ocean Road and the Otways in Victoria between March 13 and May 1, 2026, five of them tagging Visit Great Ocean Road. Re-read on October 2, they got 1,092 to 1,759 likes and comments, a median of 1,322. His usual post gets 1,248.

For a tourism board, the lesson is to judge a creator on the posts they make about places. Emily's 0.40% engagement rate would rule her out on most filters, yet her destination posts beat her normal ones. Ask a creator for the numbers on their last three destination posts, not their account average.

How to use this list

1. Start with the typical post. Compare it with the travel median for the creator's tier above, not with the all-creator figure.
2. Check the gap between average and typical. A large gap (Christine Diaz, Augie, Manisha Mayekar) means one viral post lifts the average.
3. Count the deals already running. Virginia Adventure Family had 48 sponsored posts this year and KhayJ had 15. Read how to check a creator's sponsorship history before you send an offer.
4. Match the brand to the content. A destination or a stay gets close to a normal post. eSIM, luggage and gadget offers get about half, so pay for those on that basis.
5. Agree the label before the trip. Hosted stays often go out with no ad tag. Agree whether the post carries Instagram's paid partnership label or #ad.

How we built this list

1. Find candidates. We took every public Instagram account with 1,000 or more followers that Virev read between July 1 and October 2, 2026. We kept accounts whose Virev creator profile is an individual creator and whose niche names travel, tourism, backpacking, van life, road trips, digital nomad life, cruises or overlanding, for example "Travel and lifestyle" or "Family travel". Medical tourism, relocation services and travel nursing were excluded.
2. Measure. For each account we used up to 12 recent posts from its own feed, at least three days old when read, not pinned, with like counts visible. 2,230 creators had six or more such posts. We checked a random 30 of them by hand: 25 post mainly about travel or places. The other 5 mix travel with parenting, events, fashion, home products or religious content.
3. Pick. From the English-language creators active since August 10, we kept accounts with a clear travel focus and spread them across the four tiers and the sub-niches.
4. Check by hand. On October 2, 2026 we opened 75 candidate profiles on Instagram and read the bio and recent posts. We removed 36. Two profiles were no longer available. 23 were off-niche or had drifted away from travel, for example a TV host, a reality TV star, a house renovator, a radio host, a wedding filmmaker, two truck builders, a former footballer and a creator who now posts mostly about her baby. We left out 11 more travel accounts to balance the tiers and sub-niches. None of the profiles we opened looked AI-generated.
5. Example posts. We re-read one post per creator, and every 2026 post of Emily Goes Places and the sponsored posts of Manmeet Shah, on Instagram on October 2.

Limits: Instagram does not show saves, shares or story views, so they are not in these rates. Travel posts are often saved for later trips, and saves are not counted here. The 2,230 travel creators are the accounts that Virev crawls, which lean toward accounts brands search for, not a random sample of Instagram. This list is mostly English-language. We list only public business details. Contact creators through the channels on their profiles.

Find more travel creators

The 39 creators above are a starting point. Virev creator search for "travel" lists every travel creator we track, with the same engagement numbers, and lets you filter by follower count, country and engagement rate. The top travel influencers page ranks the largest accounts, and the travel influencer marketing page explains how brands use Virev for destination and hotel campaigns.

For other niches measured the same way, see the lists of golf influencers and dog and pet influencers.