His name is Jimmy Donaldson but you know him best as MrBeast, the man behind some of YouTube’s most iconic videos. The platform’s highest earner, MrBeast’s reported net worth isn’t necessarily as robust as one might expect. In fact, some sources have it as low as USD$8 million whilst others estimate it to be around USD$25 million. To make matters even more confusing, some websites report that MrBeast’s net worth is as high as USD$55 million in 2022. Thanks, Internet!
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The numbers may vary, but one thing remains clear: when it comes to YouTube dominance, MrBeast is a beast indeed. An indisputable king of Internet stunt videos, from Squid Game to Willy Wonka, his channel basically picks things up where reality shows such as “Fear Factor” left off (complete with sizable cash payouts). Big risks for big rewards is often the name of his game and it’s seen him giving away tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars to willing participants and charitable causes alike.
So how much money does MrBeast actually have? Again, it depends on who you ask. What we can say is that his popular YouTube channels and other social media accounts earned him approximately USD$54 million in 2021 alone. However, don’t mistake gross earnings for net worth because they’re not the same thing. Remember, MrBeast redirects a ton of his income back into his own content, which is going to have a discernible impact on his bottom line. In fact, he recently told podcaster Joe Rogan that he’s previously run out of money and taken out loans to support his channel. Here’s everything we know.
Who is MrBeast?
Age: 24
Born: May 7, 1998
Country of Birth: United States of America
Profession: Professional YouTuber
Currently lives in: Greenville, North Carolina
Born in Kansas but raised in North Carolina, Jimmy Donaldson uploaded his first video to YouTube in 2012. He was just 13 at the time, operating under the handle “MrBeast6000” and rarely appearing in his videos. His earliest output was mostly of the Let’s Play variety, though he’d also comment on various YouTube dramas, offer tips to potential content creators, and estimate the net worths of well-known YouTube celebrities. His subscriber base consisted of about 240 loyal followers by 2013.
First Major Success – Counting to 100,000
By 2016, Donaldson was gaining in popularity on the heels of his “worst intro” videos, which poked fun at the various introductions he found on YouTube. He dropped out of college around this time to focus on content creation, wrangling in former childhood friends and gaming the platform’s recommendation algorithm as the subscriber count increased.
A meta-milestone if there ever was one occurred in 2017, when Donaldson broke the 100,000 subscriber mark by…well…counting to 100,000 over the course of 44 hours. The video was eventually viewed over 21 million times and later followed by various successors, such as when he counted to 200,000, read the dictionary, or watched Jake Paul‘s music video for “It’s Every Day Bro” for 10 hours straight.
MrBeast’s subscriber count continued to soar and so too did his net worth. He’s now best-known for his high-production stunt videos, in which he designs elaborate challenges and offers cash rewards to the victors. His most-viewed video to date is a meticulous re-enactment of the blockbuster Netflix series “Squid Game” and it doled out US$456,000 to the last remaining “survivor.” Through his main YouTube channel alone, he has over 136 million subscribers.
What is MrBeast’s Net Worth?
How much money does MrBeast have again? Someone out there is probably asking. Sure, we could offer some sort of vague estimate, but the truth is much harder to pin down. As we ourselves have reported, the YouTube phenom earned about USD$54 million in revenue in 2021, but much of that income went back into his own content production. MrBeast is also an avid philanthropist, whose eponymous charity has its own YouTube account.
That brings us back to the elusive topic of MrBeast’s net worth. According to Wealthy Gorilla, it’s as low as USD$8 million. Meanwhile, the folks over at Celebrity Net Worth offer an estimate of USD$25 million. We’re going to therefore assume that MrBeast’s actual net worth is somewhere in this range of USD$8-25 million, whereas the much higher estimates probably don’t account for all the cash he gives away.
Hence, when someone asks “who is the richest YouTuber?,” the answer is probably a celebrity like PewDiePie or Jake Paul. This is in spite of the fact that MrBeast was technically the platform’s highest earner in 2021 moving into 2022. But they say you have to spend money to make money and he takes the concept to extremes, often to the delight of his millions of fans. Here are his biggest sources of income:
Image: Instagram
Merchandise and Other Business Ventures
By most estimates, about 40-50 per cent of MrBeast’s net worth comes as a result of merchandising and other business opportunities. Some sources report that the YouTube star earns as much as USD$2.25 million a month through merchandising alone, including sales of his own clothing line.
In 2020, Donaldson launched MrBeast Burger, a delivery app that brings signature fast food items straight to your door. It’s currently under contract with over 1000 brick-and-mortar locations throughout North America and Europe, with plans to expand.
Along similar lines is Feastables, a chocolate bar company that MrBeast launched in 2022. In the spirit of Willy Wonka, the company routinely holds sweepstakes with prizes ranging from an Xbox game system to a Tesla Model 3.
Behind the scenes, MrBeast is a fairly active investor and partner in various startups and companies, including Backbone, Juice Funds, and Current. A firm believer in crypto, he received backlash in 2021 after Refinable—a token and NFT platform that he personally backed and promoted—plunged in value.
Ad Revenue
Like so many popular (and unpopular) YouTube channels, MrBeast’s comes with video ads. And with each video advertisement comes a respective cost per mille (CPM), which is the amount an advertiser pays a website for every one thousand people who see the ad. The exact CPM can vary from one country to the next, but most sources suggest that it averages out at around US$5 per one thousand views. Multiply that by the millions of views that each MrBeast video racks up and you begin to see all kinds of dollar signs.
Sponsorships
Well-versed in Internet economics, MrBeast reportedly asks companies to cough up around US$1 million per month to be the main sponsor on his primary YouTube page. That’s in addition to sponsors on secondary channels and other social media accounts, as well as the sponsors for his various charitable efforts and sweepstakes.
Charity Work
One might say that philanthropy makes up an essential part of MrBeast’s operation. Not only does he give away considerable cash prizes to the participants of his many stunts, but he also donates tons of money directly to charity. Over on the Beast Philanthropy YouTube channel, 100% of the ad revenue, sponsorships, and merchandise sales go to charitable organisations.
How Much Does MrBeast Spend on Videos?
If you follow MrBeast on YouTube, then you already know that his elaborate stunts don’t come cheap. Recent examples include the building of Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory, a challenge to swim with sharks, and the aforementioned “Squid Game” re-enactment, to name just a few. Not only are these videos expensive to produce, but they often find MrBeast giving away thousands and thousands of dollars in cash prizes.
Whilst different stunts cost different amounts, it’s been reported that MrBeast spends up to USD$300,000 to produce a single video. It’s then easy to understand why so many websites have a hard time pinning down his net worth. He’s also quite modest in terms of his lifestyle. As he told Joe Rogan, “I think living your life chasing like a nicer car, and a bigger and bigger box to live in is kind of like a dumb way to go about life.”
During the same podcast episode, MrBeast explained to Rogan’s surprise, “I’ve always reinvested back in the channel. Sometimes I’ve run out of money, and I’ve taken a loan.” He added that brands can take up to four months to make good on deals, causing financial delays. However, one can probably assume that Jimmy Donaldson hasn’t taken out any loans as of late.
Put everything together and you get the picture of a passionate content creator, who’d produce a blockbuster stunt and donate the proceeds to charity before buying himself a fancy car. On the other hand, MrBeast is only 24 years old and so he has plenty of time to build upon his already impressive fortune and develop a taste for big houses and sweet rides.
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General FAQ
Jimmy Donaldson aka MrBeast is currently 24 years old. He was born on May 7, 1998.
Being that MrBeast reinvests a lot of his income into video production, it's hard to pin down an accurate net worth. Some estimates have it as low as US$8 million whilst others have it as high as $55 million. One might safely assume that his net worth is somewhere between $10 million and $25 million.
