How popular was St Patrick's Day on Twitter across the world?

From Ireland to Ecuador, St Patrick's day is celebrated across the world, an analysis of Twitter highlights where the festival is most popular.

University students enjoy St Patrick's Day in Edinburgh's Cowgate. Picture: Macolm McCurrach

A new study has discovered that over 71,000 people globally used the micro-blogging site to discuss the occasion between 12 and 18 March 2016.


The snapshot of Twitter’s 305 million active users provides insight into how popular St Paddy’s Day is around the globe.


Research from marketing and technology agency DigitasLBi showed that Scotland was the eight most prolific nation on Earth in terms of St Patrick’s Day tweeters.

The data collected by DigitasLBI shows that Glasgow and Edinburgh were the only Scottish cities to make the list. Picture: DigitasLBI

When looking purely at the number of tweets larger countries like the USA, Canada and England topped the table with 49,958 , 3690 and 3152 unique authors respectively.

However when the results were weighted against population size the Republic of Ireland came out on top as the biggest St Patrick Day tweeter followed by the USA, Canada, Northern Ireland and England.

Scotland came just behind England in sixth place.

Glasgow and Edinburgh were the only Scottish cities to make the top 10 list of UK and Ireland tweeting cities when weighted by population size. Edinburgh was positioned sixth while Glasgow was seventh


Despite Scotland's close historical relationship with Ireland, it was five places behind in the top 10. Picture: DigitasLBI

The agency took note of global tweets in any language containing the hashtag #stpatricksday issued by unique authors only. Retweets were not included in the study.

Some unexpected and exotic locations for St Patrick’s Day tweets included Ecuador (with 539 unique users), Morocco (230), India (161) and Brazil (146).

The most popular cities for St Patrick’s Day tweets were overwhelmingly in the United States of America, with over 29,000 unique authors scattered worldwide.

The data collected by DigitasLBI shows that Glasgow and Edinburgh were the only Scottish cities to make the list. Picture: DigitasLBI

Top of the list came Los Angeles with 1087 authors, followed by Chicago (755) and New York City (681). Dublin came in seventh position on 409, with no Scottish city in the top 10.

The full country results are listed below: 

Top Countries for #StPatricksDay tweets (weighted by country population size):

1) Republic of Ireland

2) United States

Despite Scotland's close historical relationship with Ireland, it was five places behind in the top 10. Picture: DigitasLBI

3) Canada

4) Northern Ireland

5) England

6) Scotland

7) Ecuador

8) Wales

9) Netherlands

10) Australia

Top Countries Tweeting, unique authors

1) United States: 49958

2) Canada: 3690

3) England: 3152

4) Republic of Ireland: 1628

5) Australia: 569

6) Ecuador: 539

7) Netherlands: 421

8) Scotland: 317

9) Germany: 250

10) Morocco: 230

11) France: 224

12) Spain: 222

13) Italy: 208

14) Mexico: 201

15) South Africa: 175

16) Northern Ireland: 174

17) India: 161

18) Brazil: 146

19) United Arab Emirates: 114

20) New Zealand: 106

21) Wales: 100