More than 9 million tourists came to Brazil last year, a 37% increase compared with 2024, as fashion brands, influencers and major performers rushed to cash in on the country’s online surge and its Brazilcore glow-up.
Who Gets the Spotlight
Brazil is having a moment online and off. Celebrities and record numbers of tourists are donning green, yellow and blue, Brazilian culture is drawing global attention, and fashion brands and influencers are leaning into the hype. The trend began in 2023 with Brazilcore, a fashion movement inspired by the Brazilian flag’s colors, and it has since expanded into music, dance, cinema and sports.
For decades, Brazilians have complained that the country and its cultural output were underappreciated in what has become known as the “mongrel complex.” Now, some say a shift is underway as attention from abroad consolidates in 2026 and as “caramelo pride” grows, with Brazilians celebrating caramel-colored street mutts that have come to represent the country.
Brazilcore first gained widespread global traction in 2023. Celebrities including Bad Bunny, Emily Ratajkowski, Hailey Bieber, Tina Kunakey, Sabrina Carpenter, Alex Consani and Addison Rae have participated in the trend. Néli Pereira, a PhD candidate at the University of Sao Paulo in cultural studies who specializes in Brazil, said fashion was “very rigid, with many uniformized clothes. Suddenly came this wave from Brazil showing more skin, using more color,” and said the spontaneity and vivid color palettes resonated amid a craving for more light-heartedness.
The trend now shows up in bikinis, micro-shorts, crochet pieces, soccer shirts and accessories. Brands including Zara and H&M have put out tops in green and yellow or emblazoned with Rio de Janeiro, while Chanel, Jil Sander and Schiaparelli have all made references to Brazil’s national colors.
Who Pays for the Hype
The hype has also translated into tourism. More than 9 million tourists came to Brazil last year, a 37% increase compared with 2024. Jokes on the internet abound about the CPF, an individual’s fiscal identity in Brazil, being the new sought-after green card. In Rio, visitors head to Rocinha favela kitted out in Brazilcore and pay for footage of themselves striding out onto a terrace while a drone captures the scene before panning out to Rio’s urban landscape. Those videos have gone viral in recent months.
Eduardo Maristany, a 30-year-old tourist from Barcelona, said, “If you don’t do the video with the drone, it’s as if you didn’t come to the favela.” He said he chose Brazil after seeing an influx of videos on social media about the country’s favelas, beaches and parties.
Vitor Oliveira, a 36-year-old tour guide from Rocinha, said social networks drove the explosion of tourism in his neighborhood. “Influencers coming here were a game changer and primordial to the increase of tourism in Rio and especially in Rocinha,” he said.
The arrangement is familiar enough. People at the bottom turn their neighborhoods into content, while the platforms, brands and tourism machine harvest the attention. The drone gets the shot. Someone else gets the money.
What the Institutions Are Selling
Brazil’s pull has also reached major performers. Madonna, Lady Gaga and Shakira performed free shows on Copacabana Beach in 2024, 2025 and 2026 respectively, drawing at least a million concert-goers each time, according to Rio City Hall numbers. In 2024, Bruno Mars posted a video of himself dancing to funk music, seemingly getting a Christ the Redeemer tattoo on his chest and posing with a caramelo dog. The video drew more than 13 million likes on Instagram and ended with the words: “I love you Brazil.” Rosalia and Dua Lipa have also professed their love for Brazil online.
Brazilian culture, from Anitta’s funk music to Academy Award-nominated films such as “I’m Still Here” and “The Secret Agent,” is being celebrated on the world’s biggest stages and across the internet, turbocharging Brazil’s soft power.
Pereira said Brazil’s current spotlight is also the result of a confluence of politics, diplomacy, culture and economics, including policies that support the showcasing of Brazilian culture and a major effort by Embratur, Brazil’s government tourism agency, to attract visitors.
That’s the state and its tourism arm doing what states do best: packaging culture, steering attention, and calling it national success. The people whose lives and neighborhoods become the backdrop don’t get to set the terms.
Brazil, with a population of over 200 million, is one of the most connected countries in the world, and social media users are showcasing what Eduardo Lorenzi, general director of operations for Latin America at TikTok, called the country’s “very particular characteristic of interacting on the internet in a collective manner.” Lorenzi said, “Brazil pulsates creativity and has this very particular characteristic of interacting on the internet in a collective manner. It’s common for content to be quickly transformed into memes and cultural references.”
Brazilians are known for high engagement, a prized trait in the attention economy. Courtney Henning Novak, a Californian and prolific reader and writer, said she developed an online community composed mostly of Brazilian followers after her rave review of a 1881 book by Brazilian author Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis went viral. “Brazilians love to comment. I get more messages than I can keep up with, and there’s a lot of positive energy,” she said.
Like all trends, this one may fade. Experts predict the upcoming election and a return of political polarization may weaken the association of yellow and green with joy. French comedian Paul Cabannes, who is based in Sao Paulo and has millions of followers across different platforms, said he has watched the number of foreigners producing content almost exclusively about Brazil soar, but added, “It’s a formula that’s getting a bit tired. I think it’s harder to succeed doing this than before.” Pereira said that in an increasingly multipolar world, many Brazilians believe the country’s soft power is here to stay, but she predicted the “mongrel complex” would return if the current attention from abroad fades. “Once people stop giving us those little pats on the head, it’ll all come back,” she said.