I was recently dming a mutual [shoutout to juliet] about the xfactor twitter posting "new 1D footage" of all the boys auditions and even though louis video was posted much later than the others the louis tweet had the most likes and it got me thinking.
I truly believe louis has gained almost as many hard-core "I truly care about him" stans as H. Yes H may seem like he has gained way more stans during haitus than the rest but a third of his newer fanbase aren't stans. Their a "for the moment" local fan bc he is popular right now so they won't be here long term. They aren't the ones to keep up with where he is every month, or buy harry related things to wear out in public or know when something like music was leaked early. They are simply here as a local fan bc he's the mainstream hot boy right now.
Once again H does have a large new fanbase but I do think louis may have just as many CORE stans [not local fans] but stans as him. H looks like he has WAY more than the others bc he does these stadium concerts but local fans will buy tickets as much as core stans simply bc it's a fun thing to do and post on SM. But when it comes to any of the boys online fan interactions [where you see all the committed stans] louis has such a high engagement it's crazy.
Louis can makes a tweet just asking how we are doing and it gets 500 thousand likes. Some major artists don't even get that many likes on a tweet announcing new music! If there is any of those "vote for your fav" things involving radio stations louis gets WAY more votes than any other artist with only b** coming close in votes. His online fan engagement is incredibly high and truly shows he has way more core stans than people realize.