Popularity ranking · South Africa

The 100 most popular Poets in South Africa

This curated ranking covers the 100 largest poets in South Africa, ordered by estimated audience size from Rascasse's anonymized search-behavior signals. Out of 113 poets tracked in South Africa, the 100 ranked here account for the largest measured audience reach. Chinua Achebe, Sylvia Plath and Alexander Pushkin lead the list with a combined estimated audience of 72k people. Across all 100 entries the average audience size is 3.2k, and the largest, Chinua Achebe, reaches around 31k people in South Africa. Audience size is the estimated number of unique people in South Africa who actively engage with each poet, derived from search demand signals. Rankings reflect search-behavior signals collected across South Africa and are refreshed weekly.

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How to read this list

Rank

Position in the Top 100, sorted by audience size from largest to smallest. Updated weekly.

Audience size

Estimated number of unique people in South Africa who actively engage with this audience, derived from anonymized search-behavior signals.

Country share

Share of the global audience that is active in South Africa. A higher value means the audience is more locally concentrated here.

Avg age

Average age in years across the people who engage with this audience in South Africa, derived from anonymized search-behavior signals. A dash means demographic data is not yet available.

Female share

Share of women among the people who engage with this audience in South Africa. 50% is gender-balanced; values above mean female-skewed, below mean male-skewed.

Ranking

Rank Audience Audience size Avg age Female share Subtype
51 Charles Baudelaire 1.4k 48.8 62.1% Poet
52 Ibn Taymiyyah 1.3k 25.8 29.6% Poet
53 Miguel de Cervantes 1.3k 46.8 63.7% Poet
54 Al-Ghazali 1.2k 28.1 49.3% Poet
55 Nizar Qabbani 1.2k 35.9 57.2% Poet
56 John Henry Newman 1.2k 46.8 63.8% Poet
57 Nur Jahan 955 29.9 0.0% Poet
58 Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi 815 28.6 0.0% Poet
59 Michel Houellebecq 733 44.8 55.6% Poet
60 John Updike 705 41.1 52.7% Poet
61 Marcus Junius Brutus the Younger 703 39.6 56.1% Poet
62 Hafez 697 43.0 56.7% Poet
63 Thích Nhất Hạnh 680 45.9 58.2% Poet
64 Muhammad Taqi Usmani 663 44.3 10.9% Poet
65 Friedrich Schiller 603 43.1 60.0% Poet
66 Iris Murdoch 602 26.8 34.4% Poet
67 Qianlong Emperor 407 23.8 55.6% Poet
68 Vinayak Damodar Savarkar 375 35.4 11.5% Poet
69 Duo Duo 342 32.2 62.0% Poet
70 Michael Leunig 325 50.9 69.2% Poet
71 Algernon Charles Swinburne 294 55.3 100.0% Poet
72 Octavio Paz 283 44.4 0.0% Poet
73 Ibn Qayyim Al-Jawziyya 255 29.9 10.7% Poet
74 Audrey Niffenegger 253 49.3 85.3% Poet
75 Saadi Shirazi 252 29.3 43.4% Poet

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Frequently asked questions

How is this list of the most popular poets compiled?

Rascasse aggregates anonymized search-behavior signals across South Africa and ranks each poet by its estimated audience size. Only entries with at least 5 measured entities are listed.

How often is the list updated?

The ranking is refreshed weekly from the latest search-behavior data and re-published as a static page.

What is the largest poet in South Africa?

Chinua Achebe currently leads with an estimated audience of 31k people in South Africa.

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