• President Jair Bolsonaro has the best performance among presidential candidates in all platforms analyzed; but Facebook, Instagram and YouTube had a decrease in engagement about the president throughout 2020;
• Guilherme Boulos is the only presidential candidate able to surpass Bolsonaro in numbers of views and interactions on Instagram and YouTube. The increase happened during the 2020 elections and showed the potential for engagement of the PSOL candidate;
• There has been a slight increase in interactions in publications of left-wing and center-left candidates such as Lula, Haddad, Ciro, Boulos and Marina Silva. However, the volume is still lower than that of Bolsonaro;
• Among right-wing and center-right candidates, João Doria has the highest level of activity, but is unable to convert that into engagement; Huck is the biggest highlight with sporadic peaks; Mandetta, Eduardo Leite, Amoêdo and Sergio Moro have veru low performance.

A survey organized by the Department of Public Policy Analysis of Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV DAPP) between January 1st, 2020 and April 27, 2021 identified 34.2 thousand publications and around 1.2 billion interactions and 3.99 billion views in the official profiles of Jair Bolsonaro (no party), Lula (PT), Luciano Huck (no party), Ciro Gomes (PDT), Marina Silva (REDE), João Doria (PSDB), Eduardo Leite (PSDB), Fernando Haddad (PT), João Amoêdo (NOVO), Guilherme Boulos (PSOL), Sergio Moro (Sem Partido) and Luiz Henrique Mandetta (DEM), on Facebook, Youtube and Instagram.

During a shorter period, between October 1st, 2020 and April 27, 2021, there were also more than 35.2 thousand tweets published by the official profiles of these presidential candidates on Twitter, adding up to more than 210.9 million total interactions, of which 35.6 million were retweets and 175.3 were bookmarks. Therefore, there was a total of 69.3 thousand publications, which generated 1.4 billion interactions and 3.99 billion views (among those containing audiovisual content).

By far, Jair Bolsonaro is the presidential candidate with the most interactions, accounting for 58% of the total engagement observed in the period. Guilherme Boulos comes in second place, with 8%, followed by Luciano Huck (7%) and Lula (6%). Regarding the number of publications on Facebook, YouTube and Instagram, Guilherme Boulos is first with 28%, followed by João Doria (15%), Jair Bolsonaro (13%) and Ciro Gomes (11%).

It is important to highlight that not all presidential candidates have accounts on all the networks analyzed.

1. Twitter

On Twitter, the presidential candidates made 35.2 thousand publications between October 1st, 2020 and April 27, 2021, reaching more than 35.6 million retweets.

Publications vs. retweets in profiles of presidential candidates on Twitter
Analysis period: October 1st, 2020 to April 27, 2021

Source: Twitter | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

• Jair Bolsonaro is the presidential candidate with the highest number of retwets, with almost double those of the left-wing candidates, Guilherme Boulos and Fernando Haddad.
• Boulos is the profile with the highest number of publications and is able to convert his intense level of activity into interactions. This conversion is less successful for Ciro Gomes and particularly for João Doria.
• It is interesting to observe that the left-wing and center-left candidates occupy the positions immediately after Jair Bolsonaro, while the right-wing and center-right candidates had an engagement of less than 500 thousand retweets in the period.

Evolution of retweets in profiles of presidential candidates on Twitter
Analysis period: October 1st, 2020 to April 27, 2021

Source: Twitter | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

• March and April had a significant increase in the number of retweets in publications made by President Jair Bolsonaro.
• In March, there was a significant increase in interactions in the publications of Fernando Haddad, Lula and Guilherme Boulos, as that was the moment when the Supreme Court reinstated the former president’s political rights.
• The high level of activity and engagement around Guilherme Boulos’s account is a result of that candidate’s campaign for mayor of São Paulo.
• Ciro Gomes obtained a peak of retweets in January 2021, when he began more intensely criticizing the federal government’s administration of the pandemic.
• Maria Silva had a trend of increase in terms of retweets in March and April due to a campaign in which she responded to accusations that she is only present in electoral periods and commented on her position regarding the environmental crisis and the Summit on Climate.
• The right-wing and center-right candidates did not have significant peaks during the entire period.

2. Facebook

On Facebook, the presidential candidates made 19 thousand publications between January 1st, 2020 and April 27, 2021, reaching more than 564.9 million interactions and 2.36 billion views in posts with video content.

Publications vs. interactions in pages of presidential candidates on Facebook
Analysis period: January 1st, 2020 to April 27, 2021

Source: Facebook | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

• Like on Twitter, Bolsonaro was the presidential candidate with 150 thousand interactions more than all other potential candidates together.
• Once again, Guilherme Boulos had the highest level of activity, although he was unable to convert the number of publications in to interactions like he did on Twitter.
• In general, there was a very similar level of engagement for all presidential candidates, with higher levels of activity for Fernando Haddad, João Doria and Ciro Gomes.

Evolution of interactions in pages of presidential candidates on Facebook
Analysis period: January 1st, 2020 to April 27, 2021

Source: Facebook | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

• Bolsonaro is far ahead in numbers of interactions compared to the other presidential candidates, but his performance has decreased since May 2020, reaching its lowest level in February 2021. In March and April, he saw a slight increase in interactions.
• Among the other candidates, Luciano Huck had the sharpest peaks in May and December 2020 and in March 2021. Those peaks were related to videos about precautions to be taken and about the situation of workers during the pandemic, as well as racial issues, with comments about an episode that happened in the reality show Big Brother Brasil.
• Lula also had a peak in March in publications about the Supreme Court decision that reinstated his political rights.
• In turn, Boulos was a highlight in the context of the 2020 municipal elections, when he was a candidate for mayor of São Paulo.

3. Instagram

On Instagram, the presidential candidates made 12.2 thousand publications between January 1st, 2020 and April 27, 2021, reaching more than 613.5 million interactions and 1.5 billion views in posts with video content.

Publications vs. interactions in profiles of presidential candidates on Instagram
Analysis period: January 1st, 2020 to April 27, 2021

Source: Instagram | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

• Like on Facebook and Twitter, Bolsonaro had a higher number of interactions, far ahead of the all the other potential candidates.
• Guilherme Boulos was the presidential candidate with the highest volume of publications; however, like on Facebook, his high level of activity was not enough to increase his number of interactions compared to the other candidates.
• Luciano Huck was not among the presidential candidates with the highest number of publications, but he was a small highlight in terms of interactions.
• Once again, Ciro Gomes and João Doria were highlights as potential candidates with a higher level of activity on social media platforms, but unable to convert this communicative effort into enough engagement to distinguish themselves from other candidates.

Evolution of interactions in profiles of presidential candidates on Instagram
Analysis period: January 1st, 2020 to April 27, 2021

Source: Instagram | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

• There was a significant drop in interactions in the publications in the official page of President Jair Bolsonaro on Twitter. The peak of interactions happened during the first moments of the pandemic, a period in which Bolsonaro positioned himself against social distancing and minimized the severity of the situation. However, the following months showed a decrease in engagement about the president.
• Guilherme Boulos, during his candidacy for mayor of São Paulo, obtained a significant peak of interactions on Instagram, surpassing the engagement about Jair Bolsonaro. Boulos was the only candidate, on all networks, to obtain more interactions than the president at some point during the period analyzed.
• Sergio Moro obtained a peak of interactions in April 2020, the moment when he broke ties with President Jair Bolsonaro and left the Ministry of Justice and Public Security. Since then, the former judge did not achieve any other moments of relevant interaction.
• In general, the TV presenter Luciano Huck stays below 5 million monthly interactions, although he obtained peaks of mentions that surpassed that number at different moments. In general, his publications that went viral commented on social topics that mobilized the news in the country.

4. YouTube

On YouTube, the presidential candidates made 2.8 thousand videos between January 1st, 2020 and April 27, 2021, reaching more than 25.5 million interactions and 124.8 million views.

Publications vs. views in channels of presidential candidates on YouTube
Analysis period: January 1st, 2020 to April 27, 2021

Source: Youtube | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

• Once again, Bolsonaro was the presidential candidate with the highest number of views. However, unlike on the other networks, he is also the potential candidates with the highest volume of videos published on YouTube.
• In general, there is a similar distribution, with Boulos and Doria among those who published the most videos.
• Ciro Gomes is positioned close to other potential candidates regarding the number of videos published, but was a slight highlight in terms of views.

Evolution of views in channels of presidential candidates on YouTube
Analysis period: January 1st, 2020 to April 27, 2021

Source: Youtube | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

• Like on Instagram, Bolsonaro had a significant drop in numbers of views after April 2020. In January, March and April 2021, the number of views in the president’s videos had another increase, indicating an upward trend for the following months.
• Guilherme Boulos also had a very relevant performance on YouTube, surpassing President Jair Bolsonaro in number of views in November 2020. However, Boulos’s relevance was not maintained in other periods, with the candidate returning to low numbers of views.
• Ciro Gomes has had a more constant performance and was able to stand out from the other potential candidates in several moments in the period analyzed. In those months, he obtained around 1.5 million views.