The world of esports is upon us. There are plenty of athletes, yes, that is what they are called nowadays, who earn a lot of money by playing video games professionally. Some of these athletes are paid more than a million dollars per year. Likewise, some of these athletes have been around for a while and have been playing at the very top of the competition. Some are retired professionals who still earn a lot more than the regular joe. Here are the world’s top esports athletes, at least in terms of who earns the most.
Johan N0tail Sundstein
Sundstein is a Dota 2 player. He is famous for winning the International, the biggest tournament in Dota 2, two years in a row. He carried OG to their 2018 and 2019 titles, which is an amazing feat. But, his success story didn’t start on OG, but on his teams prior to OG, as he was a consistent player who managed to always bring the best gameplay to the table and thus, he is the highest earning player on the list, sitting at over 6 million dollars per year.
Kyle Bugha Giersdorf
As much as people want to hate on Fortnite and rightfully so, it is a very popular game which is often played by a very young audience. Fortnite is all about building and beating your opponent. Some people are very good at the game, and Bugha is one of them. Fortnite’s developer invested highly into the game’s first tournaments, which meant that the winning players went home with a lot of money. 2019 saw Bugha earn 3 million dollars from a single tournament win.
Andreas Xyp9x Højsleth
Xyp9x is a support player for Astralis, one of the best Counter Strike: Global Offensive teams on the planet. They have won plenty of majors in 2019, in no small thanks to Xyp9x who brought more to the team than just firepower. He brought stability and a rock to lean on when the team wasn’t feeling their best. This earned him 1.7 million dollars in 2019.
Lee Faker Sang-hyeok
Faker is the athlete if you ask almost anybody. Ever since his debut in 2013, he has been at the top of his game. Sure, he had years which were not as good as his “prime”, but he has been a consistent rock for SKT T1, now just T1, the Korean powerhouse. With three League of Legends world championship titles under his belt, Faker is always looking to earn another one and his team is always a fierce competitor on the international stage. His 2019 earnings were 1.2 million dollars.
These are the world’s highest paid esports athletes, all from different games.
