These Are Austria's Most Popular Lakes
Lake Constance is the most popular Austrian swimming lake on Instagram. Lake Wörthersee came in second, while Tyrol's Achensee, the newcomer to the podium, came in third. Read which other Austrian public bathing lakes took the 4th to 20th places.
Lake Constance in the Austria-Germany-Switzerland triangle remains Austria's Instagram star. / Picture: © Markus Kapferer/Westend61/picturedesk.com
Lake Constance is by far the most popular domestic swimming lake on Instagram. As of August 3, 2021, nearly two million posts were dedicated to the Vorarlberg border water body.
This was the result of an analysis by APA-Comm, for which more than 120 Austrian bathing lakes or their hashtag presence on the social photo and video platform were evaluated for the second time after 2018.
Exactly 1,964,609 posts with the hashtag #bodensee were found on Instagram. In addition to its considerable expanse of 536 square kilometers - Lake Constance is 25 times larger than Lake Wörthersee - its cross-border character is particularly decisive for the result. Located in the border triangle between Germany, Austria and Switzerland, Europe's third largest lake is a tourist magnet. The Bregenz Festival Stage, Lake Constance shipping and the flower island of Mainau are obviously of interest to photo-savvy influencers.
Second place in the ranking goes to Lake Wörthersee in Carinthia. Known for summer events such as the Fête Blanche and its iridescent turquoise color, the alpine lake attracts just under half a million postings (474,743). A comparison with other Carinthian lakes underscores the dominance of Lake Wörthersee: of a total of 29 Carinthian lakes analyzed, Lake Wörthersee alone records more postings than the remaining 28 combined. This is despite the fact that Faaker See (9th place, 85,703 postings) and Weissensee (10th place, 76,174 postings) are two other bathing lakes from the southern province in the top 10.
Third place in the ranking is occupied by a newcomer to the podium: the Tyrolean Achensee with 179,546 postings. Compared to the results from 2018, the mountain lake, which is particularly popular with surfers and sailors, improved by two ranks, relegating Neusiedler See (158,165 postings) and Attersee (152,930) to fourth and fifth place. A development that follows a general trend, according to Manuel Kerzner, analyst at APA-Comm: "Tyrol's swimming lakes show the biggest increases on Instagram compared to 2018. Six of the ten lakes with the strongest posting growth are in Tyrol."
Austria's top 20 swimming lakes on Instagram at a glance:
1. Lake Constance (Vorarlberg): 1,964,609 postings.
2. Lake Wörthersee (Carinthia): 474,743 postings
3. Lake Achen (Tyrol): 179,546 postings
4. Lake Neusiedl (Burgenland): 158,165 postings
5. Lake Attersee (Upper Austria): 152,930 postings
6. Lake Wolfgang (Salzburg/Upper Austria): 149,872 postings
7. Lake Traun (Upper Austria): 120,721 postings
8. Lake Mondsee (Upper Austria): 115,759 postings
9. Lake Faaker See (Carinthia): 85,703 postings
10. Lake Weissensee (Carinthia): 76,174 postings
11. Lake Plansee (Tyrol): 64.523 postings
12. Alte Donau (Vienna): 63,185 postings
13. Lake Hallstatt (Upper Austria): 48,330 postings
14. Lake Millstätter See (Carinthia): 47.799 Postings
15. Lake Fuschl (Salzburg): 45,597 postings
16. Lake Grüner See (Styria): 44.347 postings
17. Lake Ossiach (Carinthia): 35.212 postings
18. Lake Gosau (Upper Austria): 34.714 postings
19. Lake Walchsee (Tyrol): 28,059 postings
20. Lake Almsee (Upper Austria): 27,907 postings