10 Celebrities Who Went Viral on Social Media in 2019
Emily Bell Quick Links
It’s the year 2020. You’re either paying attention to the Royal Family or keeping up with the Kardashians. 2019 gave us exceptional faces and viral sensations to remember. Forget internet celebrities, webheads, random Joes, and their 15 minutes of fame and check out the stars who stirred up emotions, controversies, and a cult following with their social media antics.
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The year’s notable sensations include Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper cozying up at the Oscars, an American actor shaving off his beards to save the planet, Keanu Reeves and random acts of kindness, and a fan video of Kanye West eating his earwax. Here are the celebrities who made our list in no particular order.
Jennifer Lopez
It was undoubtedly a busy year for J’Lo. The superstar got engaged to former New York Yankee player Alex Rodriguez, starred in a critically acclaimed crime drama film Hustlers, and shut down Milan Fashion Week with a remake of her iconic green dress.
The diva has never been shy of showing off her shapely body. She proved lightning does strike twice (different places though) nearly 2 decades after she had the internet buzzing, wearing a low key version of the iconic plunging Versace dress at the Grammys. The original dress is said to be the motivation for Google Image search. Its suggestive makeover didn’t fail to capture the imagination of a teaming social media audience in 2019. More so confirmation of her engagement on social media with possibly the most-liked proposal pic of the year.
Justin Bieber and Hailey Baldwin
Word travels fast - faster when it involves two celebrities. The relationship between Justin Bieber and Hailey Baldwin quite spread like wildfire in the way of rumors constantly spun around their affairs.
The pair had a religious wedding ceremony and celebration with family and friends in November 2018. They made their marriage official on Instagram later that year to the wild reaction of their fans. The official - and, of course, lavish - wedding ceremony finally took place in September 2019, when they exchanged vows for the second time in front of friends and family.
Jennifer Aniston joined broke Instagram
Jennifer Aniston launched her Instagram profile with an epic selfie of hers and fellow "Friends" cast. She captioned the selfie: "And now we're Instagram FRIENDS too. HI INSTAGRAM."
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Fans of her works quickly jumped on the follow bandwagon in hundreds of thousands, and the app even experienced technical glitches. Her debut also set a new Guinness World Record for the fastest time to reach 1 million followers (in just 5 hours and 16 minutes). Prince Harry and Meghan Markle held the previous record when they launched their @sussexroyal handle in April of the same year.
Lil Nas X broke the internet
Lil Nas X, on the last day of the LGBTQ Pride month of June, delighted his fans with a series of cryptic tweets. The rapper urged fans to “listen closely” to his song “C7osure”, accompanied by a rainbow emoji and a smiley face with heart eyes. Many were left confounded by the series of tweets. Others interpreted them for his coming-out moment. The 20-year-old never contradict them in a follow-up interview with Gayle King in an episode of CBS This Morning.
Lil Nas X had a year to remember moreover. He's up for six Grammy Awards in 2020, and his hit song "Old Town Road" became the longest-running No. 1 single in the history of Billboard Magazine's Hot 100 chart. The Atlanta native, whose twitter memes are a sensation to watch, broke the internet - most notably with Old Town Road as the soundtrack of the “#yeehaw” challenge on video-sharing app TikTok.
Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper
The pair took twitter by storm when they took to the stage to perform their hit duet song "Shallow" at the Oscars. The steamy performance even sparked rumors of an actual off-screen romance between the duo.
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The chemistry between the pair was so real and played out to the letter. Gaga has, however, downplayed rumors of any romantic relationship whatsoever with Cooper, as fake. “A Star Is Born” claimed the Oscar for Best Original Song courtesy of its acclaimed smash hit “Shallow.”
Royal Baby Archie
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex took to their Instagram handle to announce his birth. They haven't hidden much about his wellbeing since then.
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The royals revealed their son has even started to crawl during a surprise meeting with military families two months ago. Cute new photos of baby Archie flooded the internet on New Year's day as part of a short video recap of their 2019 highlights.
The World Record Egg
An egg eclipsed Kylie Jenner's record for the most-liked Instagram photo in January. It's long gone to enjoy a much better recognition than its mastermind, Chris Godfrey, who works with an advertising agency in London.
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Godfrey posted an image of an egg against a white background with a straightforward appeal to “set a world record together.” His goal was to beat the numbers of likes on Jenner's photo of her baby. It smashed its intent a week later and has since been given a much-desired face-lift with subsequent interactive content.
BTS Jungkook
Internationally renowned K-pop group, BTS, are well a household name. The youngest member of the group, Jungkook, delighted millions of her digital fanbase (called ARMY) with cheeky video cover and a dapper look in 2019.
Korean news site koreaboo revealed the 22-year-old cover of pop sensation Billie Eilish's "Bad Guy" is the most-liked tweet of the year. It trailed Barack Obama and Ariana Grande's tweets at the time. His new long hair also trended in the US, after it was pictured to have grown beyond his ears at the Lotte Duty-Free Family Concert in August.
Caitlyn Jenner's #10YearChallenge
Caitlyn Jenner's incredible #10YearChallenge trumped the number of celebrities who got in on the first viral internet challenge of 2019. The Olympic gold medalist went all in, chronicling her entire sexual transformation from male to female, prompting admiration from fans for her authenticity.
The viral challenge had social media users post two photos of themselves side by side, one from 10 years ago, another from the time of the post. Cait began her transition in 2015 and had gender reassignment surgery two years later. Most celebrities, at the time, posted separate images that showed that they don't age.
Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello
Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello got the internet buzzing when they posted a video of themselves making out on Instagram. The duo had earlier teased the world with their hot romance during the performance of Señorita at the 2019 MTV VMAs. They made out so raunchily it was clear the video was a joke. Most people caught the drift others took the opportunity to troll the stars.
"So we saw on Twitter and stuff you guys saying stuff about the way we were kissing and how it looked weird like we kiss like fish," Mendes said.
"It really hurt our feelings," Cabello interjected.
"We just wanted to show you how we really kiss," he added and they both leaned in for the kiss.
Diplo ruins Joe Jonas' wedding
Diplo's Livestream of Joe Jonas and Sophie Turner's surprise wedding made massive headlines in May. The couple had gotten married in a Las Vegas wedding chapel before their lavish nuptials in France in June.
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They later disclosed that they probably would have kept the moment away from social media. The pair have, since then, continued to make fun out of the perceived feud, with Diplo sharing another post describing how they kept him from posting the second wedding.
"This is the only photo I got from Joe and Sophie Turner Jonas wedding because they took my phone from me and put in a holding cell during the ceremony. Heard it was lovely tho." Diplo wrote, supplemented with a solo shot of himself outside the venue.
