Creator Economy
The Money.
The Moves. The Strategy.

Deep dives into how creators actually make money — from brand deals and subscriptions to merch drops and live commerce. Real numbers, real strategies.

$480B
creator economy size
22
stories today
+34%
YoY growth
Market Pulse
Key numbers, updated daily
$480B
Global creator economy valuation
↑ +34% YoY
207M
Full-time creators worldwide
↑ +18% YoY
$4.9B
Brand deal spending in Q1 2026
↑ +41% vs Q1 2025
68%
Creators with 2+ revenue streams
↑ from 44% in 2023
Creator Profiles
The playbooks behind the numbers
KR
Kara Reyes
@karareyes
YouTube
$0 Budget to $1.8M/yr: The Community Post Strategy Nobody Talks About
6.2M subs$1.8M ARR0 paid ads
Kara built her entire business without a single sponsorship in year one. Her community post strategy generates 40% of her total revenue.
DW
Dev Wren
@devwren
Newsletter
The Substack Writer Making $6.7M Covering Algorithm Drama
280K paid subs$6.7M ARR48% open rate
Dev turned a nerdy obsession with social media algorithms into the most-read newsletter for platform-watchers and brand strategists.
ML
Mia Lin
@mialin
TikTok + Merch
Selling Out 10K Units in 4 Minutes Using TikTok Live Alone
14.1M followers$4.2M merch4-min sellouts
Mia has turned TikTok Live into a precision-engineered drop engine. No ads, no email list — just 14 million loyal followers and a 4-minute countdown.
TJ
Tobias Jang
@tobiasjang
Podcast
$500K in Podcast Ad Revenue Without 100K Downloads
78K listeners$500K ad rev$6.41 CPM
Tobias proves that audience quality beats quantity. His highly specific listener demo commands CPMs that rival primetime radio at a fraction of the audience size.
MB
MrBeast
@mrbeast
YouTube
300M Subscribers: Inside the Business Empire Behind the Channel
300M subs$700M est. rev10+ brands
The milestone is historic. But the more interesting story is how MrBeast has quietly built one of the most sophisticated creator media companies ever assembled.
SV
Sofia Varela
@sofiavarela
TikTok
From 0 to 10M Followers in 8 Months — The Fastest Rise of 2025
10.4M followers12 brand dealsFastest 2025
Sofia's absurdist humor format connected with Gen Z at a velocity that surprised even veteran platform analysts. Here's the content formula behind the explosion.
Strategy & Trends
What's working right now
⚔️
Platform War
Patreon vs. Substack: The $4B Battle for Creator Subscriptions

New earnings data exposes a widening gap between the two platforms' top earners — and reveals who's winning the creator trust war in 2026.

3h agoRead More →
💰
Monetization
YouTube Shorts Fund Doubles to $200M — But New Rules Catch Many Off Guard

The increased fund comes with significant new requirements around originality and AI-generated content that have already disqualified thousands of creators.

5h agoRead More →
🛍️
Commerce
Live Commerce Is Now the Fastest-Growing Revenue Stream for Creators Under 5M Followers

TikTok Shop's live selling tools are democratizing commerce for mid-tier creators — with some reporting conversion rates 8x higher than static product links.

1d agoRead More →