What Kept India Scrolling In 2025? Instagram’s Year-In-Review Has Some Clear Winners

Instagram has shared its Year-in-Review for 2025, and looking at it feels a bit like browsing through the collective memory of the year. A lot happened, and it all moved quickly. One week, everyone was talking about cricket. The next, people were arguing about work hours or sharing edits of old Bollywood scenes. It was a chaotic mix, but that’s pretty much how the internet works now.

Cricket Didn’t Just Trend. It Took Over.

Cricket continued to be the loudest voice in the room. India’s Champions Trophy win, RCB’s long-awaited moment, Virat Kohli stepping away from Test cricket and the women’s team winning the World Cup all triggered waves of posts and reactions.

These weren’t short-lived spikes. They shaped conversations for weeks, sometimes longer, and they reminded everyone that no matter how much internet culture evolves, cricket remains its anchor.

Nostalgia Stayed Strong, And The Lo-Fi Look Took Over

If your feed suddenly looked like it came from an old digital camera, you weren’t alone. The lo-fi, grainy aesthetic became one of the most common looks on Instagram.

Along with that, nostalgia continued to stick around. Wake Up Sid edits, Rockstar soundtracks, YJHD fan accounts, older Bollywood dialogues and soft throwback imagery were everywhere. People leaned into familiar things, maybe because the rest of the year felt unpredictable.

Ordinary People Became Some Of The Year’s Biggest Highlights

A lot of memorable moments didn’t come from celebrities at all.

There was the girl who reminded everyone of the Mona Lisa at the Mahakumbh. The kid who mispronounced “croissant” as “Prashant” and accidentally became a meme. A mehendi artist from Kolhapur recreated Rihanna’s wedding makeup with surprising accuracy. Sudhanshu Shukla became the first Indian in forty years to visit the ISS.

Meanwhile, recurring names like comedian Samay Raina kept appearing across reels and reaction posts thanks to India’s Got Latent.

These weren’t polished influencer moments. They were simple, unplanned and oddly relatable.

The Smaller Trends That Still Left A Mark

Some trends barely lasted a few days but were everywhere for that brief moment. Instagram highlighted quite a few:

• Veer Pahariya’s “langdi” step
• The 90-hour work week debate
• Shark Tank India Season 4 clips
• A viral Coldplay concert moment
• Fake-wedding party reels
• Labubus making an unexpected comeback
• The turmeric-glow trend
• Parineeti Chopra’s “meri body main sensations” audio resurfacing
• The “Vishal Mega Mart” meme wave
• Ultra-wide 5120×1080 thin reels

Most of these came out of nowhere. Most disappeared quickly. But they shaped how people interacted with the platform throughout the year.