Rory McIlroy’s stellar form this year has seen his online popularity surpass three of the big global brands that sponsor him, a study finds.

McIlroy ended an 18- month barren spell by winning the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth earlier this year. Back-to-back major victories at the Open Championship and US PGA Championship took him back to world number one.

All that, coupled with a successful Ryder Cup defence by the European team and a host of individual accolades, have taken his online brand reputation past Nike, Bose and Omega, according to data analytics company Adoreboard.

Adoreboard, based at Queen’s University Belfast, analyses online emotion to determine how brands are rated by the public in an index rating called Adorescore, which varies between -100 to 100.

Just over a week ago, with the clock ticking down to this Sunday’s BBC Sports Personality of the Year awards – at which McIlroy is a top contender alongside Formula One champion Lewis Hamilton – the golfer achieved an Adorescore of 51.

That put him five points ahead of sound system manufacturers Bose and Swiss watchmaker Omega, Nike languishing seven points behind McIlroy, who agreed a multimillion-pound deal to endorse its clubs last year.

Results also show that he had 40 times more mentions in online news than Nike and 60 times more than Bose.

Data scientists at Adoreboard monitored mentions of McIlroy across online news, blogs and social media.