Mike Holston's Instagram Reels, broken down

What this is

Mike Holston, who posts as The Real Tarzann, has 17,386,858 followers on Instagram, read from the profile on 27 September 2026. He is forty third on our list of the biggest Instagram accounts belonging to creators rather than celebrities, athletes or brands. Scrptly analysed his five best-performing Reels.

Five Reels. 14,111,225 views between them. All five posted between 15 and 19 September 2026, so this is one week of output.

An animal account whose best week was about wrestling

He is known for handling snakes and big cats. Four of these five Reels are a wrestling event: a match highlight, a weigh-in stare down, a grip strength contest and two athletes admitting they are nervous. Only the top one, at 5,218,711 views, is an animal video.

This is what it looks like when a creator takes their audience somewhere else for a week. The animal Reel still won, but the four off-topic ones did 8,892,514 views between them, which is not a rejection.

The whole set is five days old

Every one of these was posted between 15 and 19 September 2026. Most accounts we break down have a top five spread across months or years. His is a single week, which means either the week was unusually strong or the account posts at a volume where recent work crowds out older work.

Worth saying plainly: with a five day window, this page is a snapshot of one event rather than a portrait of the account.

Nervousness is the hook that works

"You ready? Me? Hell no. You nervous?" is the smallest Reel of the five at 1,087,911 views, and it is the most interesting line on the page. Two competitors admitting fear before a match is the opposite of the confidence these videos usually open with.

The five run 34, 117, 38, 78 and 25 seconds, so 4 minutes 52 seconds in total. The longest is the match itself, which needs the time. The shortest is the one where somebody admits they are scared.

The hooks he uses

What you can copy

• Your audience will follow you off topic for a week. Four of these five are nothing like what the account is known for.
• Ambient sound can replace a spoken hook when the setting is the story.
• Predict the payoff out loud. Naming what is about to happen is a cheaper hook than hiding it.
• Admitting nerves reads as real in a category built on bravado, and it earned over a million views here.

Questions people ask

How many followers does Mike Holston have on Instagram?

17,386,858, read from his profile on 27 September 2026. That makes him forty third among Instagram accounts belonging to creators rather than celebrities, athletes or brands.

What is his most viewed Reel?

A 34 second clip of a black snake being removed from a squat toilet, at 5,218,711 views, posted 15 September 2026. It is the only animal video in his top five. It is linked above.

How long are his Reels?

The five analysed run 34, 117, 38, 78 and 25 seconds, so 4 minutes 52 seconds in total. The longest is a full wrestling match highlight.

What does The Real Tarzann post about?

Animals, normally. In the week measured here, four of his five best Reels were wrestling coverage and only one was wildlife. The wildlife one still came first.

How were these numbers measured?

Scrptly pulled his recent posts and analysed the five best-performing Reels on 27 September 2026. Each view count is the figure recorded at that moment, not an estimate, and each Reel links out so it can be checked.