PewDiePie ‘made £54MILLION from ads and merch in 2019’ before quitting YouTube, experts claim
THE astonishing earnings of one of YouTube's biggest stars have been revealed by experts.
Swedish video-maker PewDiePie earned a whopping £54million in 2019, banking £7million in September alone.
Even in November, his least successful month of the year, the YouTuber – who boasts 102million subscribers – banked close to £3million, according to researchers.
The news follows PewDiePie's announcement last month that he was taking a break from YouTube, saying he was "very tired".
The monthly revenue generated by the 30-year-old internet star, real name Felix Kjellberg, was estimated using online tool Selfy.
It calculated the minimum and maximum monthly revenue he could make from selling merchandise and from ads on the video site.
Figures revealed that PewDiePie made a whopping £54.1million in 2019 – enough to allow him to retire for life should he choose not to return to video making.
The Scandinavian's most successful period was September, during which he made £6,9million from ads and merch alone.
This is the same month he began playing hugely popular video game Minecraft on his channel, a move which proved a great success.
PewDiePie's second most successful month was August, the same month he married Marzia Bisogning, now Kjellberg, his girlfriend of eight years.
The worst months were November and December 2019, during which he earned a little under £3million.
The research was carried out by online marketplace .
PewDiePie recently announced he was stepping back from YouTube.
"I am taking a break from YouTube next year," he revealed in a video posted December 16. "I wanted to say it in advance because I made up my mind.
PewDiePie's antisemitism scandal
Here's everything you need to know...
- In 2017, Disney announced it would be severing links with PewDiePie over several controversial videos he had released.
- Some of the videos contained references to Nazis and were found to be antisemitic.
- Among them was one clip in which he paid two Indian nationals to hold a sign saying: "Death to all Jews."
- A statement from Disney subsidiary Maker Studios read: "Although Felix has created a following by being provocative and irreverent, he clearly went too far in this case and the resulting videos are inappropriate."
- He courted controversy again in December 2018 after doing a shout-out to an anti-Semitic video channel.
- During his Pew News segment he directed viewers to E;R, an essayist which slips anti-Semitic and misogynistic comments into videos about anime and films.
- But the 29-year-old said he wasn't familiar with the channel’s content and blasted what he called a "shame campaign".
- He said: "Anyone with the level-headed brain can tell that I don't know this guy. (It's) a shame campaign to smear my name."
- But in his most recent video, PewDiePie said he regretted promoting the channel and wouldn't have done it if he was more familiar with its content.
- He added: "I removed E;R from that video.
- "If I knew then what I knew now, I wouldn't have put him in there... I'll be more careful in the future."
"I'm tired. I'm feeling very tired. I don't know if you can tell. Just so you know, early next year I'll be a way for a little while.
"I'll explain that later but I wanted to give a heads up," he added.
In August, he hinted he could be stepping back from the platform soon, saying: "I do think it would be good for me to take a break at some point.
"It would be nice to not have YouTube in my brain for the first time in 10 years."
Kjellberg was extremely popular on the platform, and was its most subscribed user for six years from 2013 to 2019.
He was eventually overtaken by Indian record label T-Series, which now has around 123million subscribers.
PewDiePie has had his fair share of controversies over the years.
In September 2017 he was at the centre of a firestorm after using the racial slur "n*****" in one of his videos.
He had previously found himself at the centre of a racism row when he appeared to use the word "n*****" in a video watched by 2.7million people.
The Swede sparked an anti-Semitism storm after he paid two men to unravel a banner bearing the message "Death to all Jews". The video was viewed by 6.6million people.
It resulted in his reality show being cancelled by YouTube, who dropped him from its premium advertising channel.
PewDiePie quickly issued an emotional response to the claims of anti-Semitism, appearing to choke back tears as he spoke out against the backlash.
His fans have since targeted the American journalist who unearthed the video and hacked his Twitter account in revenge for the perceived attacks on the much-loved YouTuber's reputation.
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In other news, YouTube's top earners were revealed by a report in September – and PewDiePie tops the list.
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And, YouTube recently came under fire because it apparently ‘ignored staff pleas to delete hateful videos’ to boost views for years.
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