Featured Image Credit: Brendon Thorne / Stringer / Getty / YouTube / MrBeast
Popularity brings in large sums of money. So there's no doubt MrBeast rakes in some serious cash from his ventures.
In June 2024, the YouTuber - real name Jimmy Donaldson - took the title of the world's most subscribed YouTuber, overtaking the Indian music channel T-Series which held the spot since 2019.
When he took the crown, the now 26-year-old posted on X (formerly Twitter) saying he had 'finally avenged Pewdiepie,' referring to YouTuber Felix “PewDiePie” Kjellberg who had a lengthy subscriber battle with T-Series before conceding in March 2019.
Donaldson makes the majority of his income from his YouTube channel and Feastables food brand.
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Additionally, MrBeast uploaded his first-ever full-length video to X which was a massive showcase of cheap to luxurious cars from September 2023 to compare his earnings from YouTube.
He shared his whopping $263,000 earnings from a week of being posted on X which gained a response from the owner of the platform, Elon Musk.
But despite pulling in around $700 million each year, Donaldson claims he’s not rich.
As of September 2024, the American YouTube personality has 317 million subscribers. His insanely popular videos featuring wild experiments and a luxurious lifestyle regularly hit over 100 million views.
“Each video does a couple million in ad revenue, a couple million in brand deals,” he told Time Magazine. Reportedly, these brands pay between $2.5 million and $3 million just for a shout-out in his videos.
But that money doesn’t go into his bank account. In fact, he doesn't even have access to it if it did.
“I don’t have access to any of my bank accounts,” he added. “I have a CFO and everything, but [my mom is] the one who has access to the master bank account.”
Instead of pocketing any profits, the income supposedly goes back into growing his brand and audience, as per MrBeast.
He continued: “I’ve reinvested everything to the point of—you could claim—stupidity, just believing that we would succeed. And it’s worked out.”
The YouTuber's investments include going over budget on elaborate stunts like buying a grocery store and giving contestants $10,000 every day they can live in it.
A shoot that captures 12,000 hours of footage may end up as a video that is just 15 minutes long, Time reported.
That said, Donaldson isn’t exactly struggling for cash.
According to the New York Post, he has a personal chef and a trainer and lives in a spacious 3,000-square-foot home he bought for $320,000 in 2018.
Looking towards his future, Donaldson admits that he may eventually reap the financial benefits of his fame.
“I’m not naïve; maybe one day,” he concluded. “But right now, whatever we make, we reinvest.”
