Drizzt has sold over 30 million copies as of 2019. Ed Greenwood well over 3 million copies, other popular authors at least a million copies and don't forget most of the adventures have been for FR.
Leaving Money on the Table: Why is There No New D&D Fiction Being Published?
When new players get pulled into D&D what is the first setting they run into? FR.
FR has a $100,000,000 dollar movie to make and FR TV shows in the works.
And FR novels like my paper back copy of Brimstone Angels is worth $100 now.
FR got the first MtG sets, the big video games like BG3, so no Exandia is not more popular, the whole world isn't hugely into social media so focusing on social media misrepresents things. And WotC straight up said their most popular setting is the Forgotten Realms, not Exandia, the Forgotten Realms.
And I finally found out the villains responsible for killing the novel line, it was Hasbro! The geniuses who killed the novel line right before both D&D and MtG exploded in popularity.