- Professional Fortnite Players earn millions from competing in tournaments
- The average NFL Rookie footballer salary is $6,087,846.00
- The top Fortnite Player of all time is Kyle ‘Bugha’ Giersdorf
- Many eSports players supplement their income through YouTube and Twitch
Fortnite broke its own records on Saturday 4th November with 44 million players logging on across the world to generate an astounding 102 million hours of play.
While Fortnite might provide the opportunity for a bit of downtime after a stressful day in the office, for a lucky and select group of individuals, playing Fortnite is a career. We may not look upon eSports with the same reverence as traditional sports, and a Fortnite tournament is unlikely to sell out a stadium, yet the career path can be just as lucrative as it is for some Rookie NFL players. We at Moneyzine have analysed the earnings of top Fortnite players and compared it to the reported salaries of NFL Rookie Players:
Top Five High Earning Professional Fortnite Players
Kyle ‘Bugha’ Giersdorf
Kyle was just 16 year’ old when the 2019 Fortnite World Cup took place. Yet he managed to win the tournament and take home over $3 million.
Total five-year earnings: $3,635,221.72
David ‘Aqua’ Wang
David’s runner-up position at the 2019 Fortnite World Cup bagged him an impressive $1.5 million dollars. Nowadays the Austrian player also plays Minecraft professionally, yet Fortnite is where his true talents lie.
Total five-year earnings: $2,190,540.23
Harrison ‘Psalm’ Chang
Harrison chose to retire from Fortnite in 2021 and focus his attention on the game, Valour. However, prior to this his earnings from Fortnite still rank him as the third highest earning player of all time.
Total five-year earnings: $1,874,588.80
Shane ‘EpikWhale’ Cotton
Like most players listed, Shane’s big break came in the 2019 Fortnite World Cup finals where he managed to take home $1 million.
Total five-year earnings: $1,781,767.32
Anas El-Abd
Danish Anas won Mr Beast’s Extreme Survival Challenge in 2022 and his $1 million win from the game cemented his status as the fifth highest paid Fortnite player in the world.
Total five-year earnings: $1,587,777.55
Against this we have looked at the annual earnings of entry-level players in the NFL Championship:
Player Name | NFL Team | Base Salary |
|---|---|---|
Brian Burns | Carolina Panthers | $16,012,000 |
Marquise Brown | Arizona Cardinals | $13,413,000 |
Jonah Williams | Cincinnati Bengals | $12,604,000 |
Devin White | Tampa Bay Buccaneers | $11,706,000 |
Calvin Ridley | Jacksonville Jaguars | $11,116,000 |
Josh Allen | Jacksonville Jaguars | $10,892,000 |
Christian Wilkins | Miami Dolphins | $10,753,000 |
Noah Fant | Seattle Seahawks | $6,850,000 |
Chase Young | San Francisco Giants | $5,323,217 |
Devin Duvernay | Baltimore Ravens | $4,304,000 |
Jeff Okudah | Atlanta Falcons | $3,682,076 |
C.J Henderson | Carolina Panthers | $3,407,639 |
Mekhi Becton | New York Jets | $3,125,370 |
Ezra Cleveland | Jacksonville Jaguars | $2,993,000 |
Mike Onwenu | New England Patriots | $2,993,000 |
Damien Lewis | Seattle Seahawks | $2,993,000 |
Darnell Moody | Chicago Bears | $2,993,000 |
Tee Higgins | Cincinnati Bengals | $2,993,000 |
Michael Pittman Jr. | Indianapolis Colts | $2,993,000 |
Chase Claypool | Miami Dolphins | $2,993,000 |
Jaylon Johnson | Chicago Bears | $2,993,000 |
Jonah Jackson | Detroit Lions | $2,992,000 |
Robert Hunt | Miami Dolphins | $2,992,000 |
Kamren Curl | Washington Commanders | $2,992,000 |
Source: Spotrac.com
Taking the average of the above annual earnings, NFL rookie players come out with a salary of $6,087,846.00. By contrast, our five Fortnite players generated an average of $442,795.80 per annum over their five years of gaming. On the face of it, even Kyle Giersdorf with his talents can’t take on the big dogs of the NFL, but there is more than first meets the eye.
Supplementary Incomes Matter
In addition to Kyle’s gaming, he runs extremely successful channels on both YouTube and Twitch. His Twitch channel boasts 4.46 million subscribers and is set to generate $7,970 per month, while his YouTube channel nets him a further $27,000 every month. His streaming income is therefore thought to pull in around $420,000 a year. Kyle is also signed to the eSports team ‘Dignitas’, where top players are reported to earn an average of $45,000.00 per year.
NFL footballers also have supplementary incomes though, and if we take Kamren Curl as an example, we can see that on top of his base salary he generated a signing bonus of $28,332, a cap hit of $3,020,332 and a dead cap hit of $28,332 which brings his yearly cash in line with $5,390,328.
What Does the Future Hold?
There can be no doubt that Fortnite is here to stay, and Saturday’s news shows that the game is now as popular as it’s ever been. Retaining a solid support base, with a record 6.2 million concurrent players:
“While the data shows that it will be a while until the public hold Fortnite players in the same thrall as NFL players, what it does illustrate is just how lucrative and legitimate a career path professional gaming can be. At just 20 years’ old, Kyle Giersdorf has made an extremely successful career for himself and it's worth remembering that there are 21 eSports players who generate an even higher income than he does. While it may be a while before eSports tournaments sell out stadiums, for those who are able to master online gaming, the sky's the limit”Jonathan Merry, personal finance expert at Moneyzine
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