Taylor Swifts Billionaire Era: How She Hit Ten Figures In Eight Years

Quick Links

• 2016: Taylor Swift Becomes The World's Highest-Earning Celebrity

• 2017: Taylor Swift’s (Relatively) Bad Year For Earnings

• 2018: Taylor Swift Is The Second Highest-Earning Female Celebrity

• 2019: Taylor Swift Is Ascendant, And Breaking More Records

• 2020: An Unfortunate Year For All (Including Taylor Swift)

• 2021: Taylor Swift Is The Highest-Grossing Female Singer

• 2022: Taylor Swift Is Again The Highest-Grossing Female Singer

• 2023: A Life-Changing Year For Taylor Swift

Highlights

• Taylor Swift's net worth has grown significantly in recent years, with a rise of over 25 percent in 2023 alone. She is now a billionaire and one of the richest female musicians in the world.
• Throughout her career, Swift has broken several records and achieved immense success, including becoming the highest-grossing singer in a year and earning the title of highest-grossing female singer for multiple years.
• The success of Swift's Eras Tour has been a game-changer for her, grossing over $1.3 billion worldwide and potentially becoming the highest-grossing tour of all time. With her continued success, it is possible that her net worth may surpass that of Rihanna.

Before 2023, Taylor Swift's net worth was an impressive $570 million dollars, and it rose to over $700 million by June.

In the first 18 years of her career, she amassed half a billion dollars – but this year brought a tremendous amount of change for Taylor Swift.

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Now the Pennsylvania-born singer is a billionaire, and one of the richest female musicians in the world – second only to "Caribbean Queen" Rihanna.

Taylor Swift has broken several records, including "Musician Who Earned Most In A Year," a record previously held by Bruce Springsteen (with earnings of $435 million in 2021, or an inflation-adjusted value of $470 million in 2023).

Swift's blockbuster career started in 2004. At the age of 14, she began performing her own songs on stage and garnered the attention of ATV/Sony Records.

The rising star secured her first contract later that year, becoming the youngest singer to sign with Sony/ATV Tree publishing house.

Taylor's ship had come in, and a powerful musician was about to emerge.

Scott Borchetta, who established his own label (Big Machine Records), signed Taylor Swift in 2006.

She released her first single, "Tim McGraw," which became an instant hit.

Later in 2006, she released her self-titled debut album, and within just a year, at the age of 17, she became a platinum-certified singer, selling millions of copies in the United States.

Years In Which Taylor Swift Was The Highest-Earning Celebrity

Swift has been making hits and breaking records for the duration of her nearly two decades-long career, but only hit billionaire status in 2023.

Let's look at Swift's road to fame and massive fortune, year by year.

8 2016: Taylor Swift Becomes The World's Highest-Earning Celebrity

Taylor Swift was building a vast fan base, amassing numerous awards, and gradually increasing her net worth.

However, in 2016, she emerged as the world's prototypical "pop star."

The 1989 World Tour ended in December 2015, and in 2016, she began to reap the profits of the tour.

After the tour wrapped, it hauled in an estimated profit of $250.7 million, and Swift sold 2.7 million tickets.

In 2016, through brand partnerships with Diet Coke, Keds, and Apple, Taylor became the world's top-earning musical celebrity in 2016, pocketing $170 million.

7 2017: Taylor Swift’s (Relatively) Bad Year For Earnings

2017 was a "bad year" in terms of Taylor Swift's earnings, and with respect to her ranking as a pop star.

She plummeted from the number-one spot as the highest-earning celebrity, and fell drastically, to the 49th spot.

That year also involved some back and forth in her ongoing feud with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian, and People magazine explained:

While her first Yeezy-inspired track (2010's "Innocent") was a heartfelt, understated ballad, her 2017 offering is extra AF — but probably just as heartfelt.

"There I was giving you a second chance / If only you weren't so shady / But you stabbed me in the back while shaking my hand / And therein lies the issue / Friends don't try to trick you / Get you on phone and mind-twist you," she coyly quips over sirens and bumping bass on the theatrical bop.

"Forgiveness is a nice thing to do," she adds in her best holier-than-thou voice before bursting into a cackle. "I can't even say it with a straight face."

But due to her Reputation album and her endorsements, she was able to earn $44 million in 2017.

However, she endured a dramatic net worth decrease of $126 million – a significant sum at the time in relation to her overall wealth.

6 2018: Taylor Swift Is The Second Highest-Earning Female Celebrity

The twelve-time Grammy winner’s 2018 was impressive, particularly in contrast with the previous year.

She earned $80 million in 2018, becoming the second highest-earning female celebrity in a year – this time landing just behind Katy Perry, who earned $83 million in 2018.

Swift kicked off her fifth concert tour, The Reputation Stadium Tour, on May 8, 2018, and it was a huge success.

There were 53 shows, and nearly three million audience members bought tickets for the tour, which grossed $345 million in revenue, breaking records.

5 2019: Taylor Swift Is Ascendant, And Breaking More Records

Taylor Swift's star rapidly rose again, and by 2019, she became the highest-grossing singer ever in a year.

In 2019, she added $185 million to her bank account.

Swift reaped the rewards of the highest-grossing concert she held in 2018.

Taylor released her album Lover – her 7th studio album – which was a massive hit, immediately becoming the top-selling album on the Billboard 200.

Lover wasn't only popular in America; it also sat at the top position of various countries' charts, including the UK, Australia, Canada and Mexico.

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Swift's Lover album sold 3.2 million copies in 2019, and became the year’s highest-selling album.

After the album's huge success, Taylor Swift announced a one-off City Of Lover concert, reserved for fans who had won online tickets through concerts and album purchases.

4 2020: An Unfortunate Year For All (Including Taylor Swift)

A year that needs no introduction, 2020 was "the pandemic year," one which financially challenged nearly all people – including musicians.

But Taylor Swift released two albums that year, and was able to add $23.8 million to her net worth.

Folklore was released on July 24th 2020 and by the 25th, the album had been streamed a record shattering 72 million times. In just three days, Folklore sold 400,000 copies.

The album debuted at the number one spot on the Billboard 200 chart, becoming her seventh consecutive album to dominate the Billboard charts.

Like Folklore, her Evermore album (which served as something like an extended version of Folklore) was released as a surprise drop on December 11th.

Taylor Swift's ninth studio album, Evermore sold one million times in just a week.

3 2021: Taylor Swift Is The Highest-Grossing Female Singer

As the chaotic events of 2020 carried over into 2021, the situation was dire; there were no concerts in 2021, and that was the least of everyone's worries.

However, Taylor Swift is nothing if not a hard-working artist, and she didn’t back down during a time of anxiety and global turmoil.

Her album Evermore was a huge success in 2021, becoming the best-selling alternative music album in her home country, and it topped the UK's "Americana" charts as well.

Taylor Swift earned $52 million by releasing her album songs in the digital realm, and she also created the short film All Too Well, an adaptation of her song by the same name.

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As is often the case with Swift's releases, All Too Well was well-received and widely acclaimed, illustrating Swift's pure business acumen; she evolved quickly to adapt to the situation.

After Swift found herself unable to perform in concert and interact with her audience, she pivoted to display her musical brilliance on the internet, and leveraged alternative channels of distribution.

2 2022: Taylor Swift Is Again The Highest-Grossing Female Singer

When 2022 rolled around, Taylor Swift unexpectedly made history, becoming the first singer to occupy all ten positions at the top of Billboard's Hot 100.

Swift’s Midnights album achieved this record, as the magazine reported on October 31st of that year, blazing past Drake's nine-song record from 2021:

Taylor Swift scores one of the most historic weeks in the 64-year history of the Billboard Hot 100 songs chart, as she becomes the first artist to claim the survey’s entire top 10 in a single frame.

Swift surpasses Drake, who logged nine of the Hot 100’s top 10 for a week in September 2021.

According to The Guardian, Midnights netted $230 million in sales, and sold over six million copies globally.

Taylor Swift also re-recorded several albums as part of a controversy over the ownership of her masters, and her re-releases of Red and Fearless were particularly lucrative:

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In 2022, Swift earned $92 million, and became the highest-earning female singer of the year for the second consecutive time.

Recap: Taylor Swift's Seven-Year Earnings, Through 2022

1 2023: A Life-Changing Year For Taylor Swift

In the years leading up to 2023, Taylor Swift was a mega-star in every sense of the word, but she wasn't done making (and breaking) records.

Her Eras Tour was the event that truly changed her life, launched her career into the stratosphere, and showed that Swift had even more accomplishments in store for fans.

The Grammy Award-winning artist's sixth tour grossed $780 million solely on the domestic leg of the tour.

Worldwide, Swift's tour has grossed $1.3 billion dollars, and was anticipated to become the highest-grossing tour of all time globally.

According to CNN's August analysis, Swift was expected to wrest that title from Elton John:

[Projections based on ticket sales and other factors add up to approximately] to $2.2 billion — and that would make “Eras” the highest-grossing tour ever.

Elton John’s “Farewell Yellow Brick Road” tour was the previous record holder, grossing over $887 million from 2018 to 2023, according to Larry Miller, director of the music business program at New York University Steinhardt.

“We’re talking about a global pop artist who faces virtually infinite demand for those tickets,” said Miller of Swift.

“Eras” has become one of the biggest social events of [2023], with concertgoers doling out thousands of dollars on tickets, outfits, transportation and travel accommodations.

The Eras Tour sold more than two million tickets in just a day, another record set by the brilliant artist.

Taylor Swift went on to release the Eras Tour movie with AMC on October 13, 2023.

In just a week, the concert film earned $92 million, becoming the highest-grossing concert movie ever, and it went on to earn hundreds of millions of dollars.

Breakdown: Taylor Swift's Net Worth, Year By Year

After the huge success of the tour and concert film, Taylor Swift still didn’t stop racking up wins.

With more time left on the 2023 clock, Swift dropped a re-release of the fan favorite album 1989 on October 27, 2023 – nine years to the day of the original album's release.

Swift once described the situation that led to her re-releases as a "worst case scenario" for her, but 1989's re-release was the thing that officially made Taylor Swift a billionaire.

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At the end of 2023, Taylor Swift was still in the process of breaking records, as was the case with her re-recorded version of 1989, which broke the record for the highest single-day streams globally on Spotify.

The album has been streamed 176 million times worldwide, landing just behind her album Midnights (2022).

1989 broke Midnights' record on Amazon, and became the highest streamed album globally in a single day.

By all accounts, Taylor Swift's net worth is now $1.1 billion, with an entire month left in 2023.

Her Eras Tour is still rolling, her movie conquered theaters, and her re-recorded version of 1989 is still fresh and selling like hotcakes.

It would come as no surprise if Taylor Swift's net worth surpasses that of the world's current richest female singer, Rihanna – who is currently sitting on a fortune of $1.7 billion.

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