It’s that time of year again: Forbes has released its annual ranking of the 50 top digital content creators on the internet. As usual, MrBeast sits squarely in spot #1, with an untouchable $300 million in earnings.
But there is something new for 2026.
As Forbes puts it, “For the first time in the five-year history of the Top Creators list, the ranking of the 50 most powerful influencers collectively broke the billion-dollar mark, bringing in a total of $1.02 billion.”
That figure is a 20% jump from the $853 million the top 50 creators made in 2025, and an 80% jump from the $570 million they made when Forbes first started publishing the list in 2022. Forbes attributes the earnings jump to the fact that our creator industry “is no longer trying to break into show business, but has become it.”
It cites the box office success of creator-led films like Backrooms and Obsession (Iron Lung and The Amazing Digital Circus should be there too), plus creator IP deals with Netflix and Amazon, as well as creators’ growing entrepreneurialism (launching retail brands and their own production studios), the collective expansion into FAST TV streaming, and the prevalence of longer-term, farther-reaching brand partnerships.
Like always, Forbes‘ estimations of creator revenue are just that–estimations–and it says it ranks creators based on a combination of “account earning, entrepreneurship, and clout (follower and engagement ratio).”
Here are the top 10 for 2026:
- MRBEAST
- $300M earnings, 873M followers, avg 3% engagement, and an entrepreneurialism score of 4 out of 5
- Highlights: His YouTube channels turning over >5B views a year, his food brands Feastables and Lunchly, his Amazon show Beast Games, his analytics tool Viewstats, and his company’s recent purchase of finance app Step
- DHAR MANN
- $65M earnings, 171M followers, avg 0.09% engagement, 4/5
- Highlights: 300+ million views a week, high level of content translation (13 diff languages), becoming the NFL’s “Chief Kindness Officer,” and securing a deal with Fox to produce 40 microdramas
- STEVEN BARTLETT
- $52M, 38.7M, 0.22%, 4/5
- Highlights: His Diary of a CEO podcast paving the way to a holdings company reportedly worth $425M, partnerships with Spotify, LinkedIn, and Adobe, investments in Replit and Lovable, and his six-seasons-strong spot on Shark Tank-esque investment show Dragons Den
- MARKIPLIER
- $38M, 76.8M, 0.21%, 4/5
- Highlights: Iron Lung‘s $50+ million box office, his resulting distributor/aggregation deal with YouTube that could see him personally bringing more creator films to the platform, and his podcasts Distractible and Go! My Favorite Sports Team
- RHETT & LINK
- $37M, 45.6M, 0.12%, 4/5
- Highlights: 240 episodes per year for flagship Good Mythical Morning, but even more than that is spinoff channel Mythical Kitchen with its popular Last Meal series snagging guests like Tom Hanks, Matthew Lillard, Brennan Lee Mulligan, Gordon Ramsay, and Ed Sheeran
- CHARLI D’AMELIO
- $18M, 209.8M, 11.59%, 4/5
- Highlights: Her & Juliet Broadway run, getting into YouTube vlogs, her Prada ambassadorship and starring in Kate Spade campaigns. Forbes‘ conclusion: “The moves may be the same, but the stage is a lot bigger now.”
- DRUSKI
- $20M, 38.5M, 13.77%, 4/5
- Highlights: His bouquet of YouTube reality series, his ad campaigns with T-Mobile and Dunkin’, his recent collabs with Kevin Hart, Timothee Chalamet, Jeff Bridges, and Zoe Saldana, and his spot as the 2026 BET Awards host
- ISHOWSPEED
- $30M, 184M, 0.39%, 4/5
- Highlights: Collabs with major athletes like Cristiano Ronaldo, travel tours like Speed Does America and Speed Does Africa, partnerships with Dick’s Sporting Goods, Beats By Dre, and Doritos, and his World Cup 2026 Tour with FIFA
- MARK ROBER
- $30M, 90.7M, 0.23%, 4/5
- Highlights: His STEM subscription kit company CrunchLabs, working with brands like Rivian, Google, and Disney on educational content, and his recent TED Talk on revitalizing the U.S.’s STEM education system
- CODIE SANCHEZ
- $31M, 10M, 0.37%, 4/5
- Highlights: Her get-rich-quick busting and knowledge of slow-wealth-build side hustles like laundromats and vending machines; “I looked down the pipe and was like, ‘Do I want to be a bad guy owning all the businesses or do I want to help other people do it?’ And I decided the latter seemed more fun.”
You can see the full list here.
