MrBeast has become famous for giving away staggering amount of money in his YouTube videos - but where does it all come from?
The American YouTube sensation has a staggering 130m subscribers, making him the fourth-most-subscribed on the video platform and most popular channel which doesn't belong to a company.
MrBeast, real name Jimmy Donaldson, started his channel in early 2012 at the age of 13 with videos of himself playing computer games and, ironically, estimating the wealth of other YouTubers.
Now the 24-year-old's videos consist of attention-grabbing stunts, in which he mostly either gives away millions of dollars or gets people compete to win mega cash prizes.
His channel has become so big that he now hires his childhood pals to help him run the brand, set up the challenges and deliver his incredible acts of kindness.
Net worth
Having started out rather unsuccessfully as a 13-year-old on YouTube, MrBeast first started to gain a following three years later in 2013 by poking fun at some of his rivals' intros.
He first went viral in 2017 with a video of himself counting to 100,000, which took him 44 hours.
Jimmy soon realised what worked with the YouTube algorithm and did similar stunts, such as spinning a fidget spinner for 24 hours or listening to a Jake Paul music video for 10 hours straight.
MrBeast hit 1 million subscribers in 2017 and now gets most of his hits from either competing in or hosting hours-long endurance stunts.
When his videos go viral, he makes "tens of millions" of dollars in advertising sales - providing higher engagement and reception than TV ads but at half the cost.
By December 2018 he had given out $1 million through his outlandish stunts, earning him the title of 'YouTube's biggest philanthropist'.
Jimmy has also branched out into money-making ventures, such as MrBeast Burger restaurants and his Feastables food company which sells MrBeast Bars of chocolate.
He has also invested in tech startup backbone One, partnered with Creative Juice financial network and become a long-term investor and partner of financial technology company Current.
In January 2022, it was reported that MrBeast was the highest-earning YouTuber, making $54 million in 2021.
Forbes estimate Donaldson is worth a staggering $500 million - and he reportedly wants to sell a 10% stake in his studio for $150 million, valuing it at $1.5 billion.
Beast Philanthropy
Wanting to help more people, MrBeast decided to set up a separate channel for his charity work, Beast Philanthropy.
Starting in September 2020, the charity donates 100% of its revenue, brand deals, and merchandise sales to different causes,
They partner with other charitable organisations to alleviate homelessness, hunger, and unemployment.
Primarily operating as a food bank, Beast Philanthropy has donated over an estimated 1 million pounds of food.
When New Orleans was hit by a hurricane in 2021, Jimmy's team helped cook meals to hand out to those in need.
Other videos have seen MrBeast feed 10,000 families for Thanksgiving, give $300,000 to student and give $3,000,000 in aid to Ukrainian refugees.
The team have also saved an orphanage in South Africa, rebuilt homes for tornado survivors, built wells in Africa and flown kids living on the streets to the 2022 World Cup.
YouTube stunts
MrBeast also gives away huge amounts of money on his main channel, usually through hilarious and sensational stunts.
These usually come in the form of endurance challenges, such as offering a man $500,000 to survive 100 days alone in a circle.
He has also given a $1,000,000 prize for an extreme game of Hide And Seek and a jet for the person who could keep their hand on it the longest.
Jimmy even offered people $100,000 to quit their job on the spot, $10,000 for every day they could spend in jail and $500,000 for 100 kids to try and outlast 100 adults in a circle.
One of his more dystopian video was a real-life Squid Game, where participants had to compete in a less deadly version of the Netflix series in order to win $456,000.
While the games were obviously toned down to not include horrific deaths, it still created heated competition and cost more than half a billion dollars to shoot.
Team Trees and Team Seas
MrBeast teamed up with fellow YouTuber and former NASA engineer Mark Rober for their own fundraising event, Team Trees.
Starting in October 2019, they wanted to raise $20 million for the Arbor Day Foundation, which pledged to plant one tree for every dollar donated.
It got the attention of some big YouTubers and big donations from execs such as Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki and Tesla boss Elon Musk.
Within a few months their goal was exceeded, and now a staggering 24 million trees have now been planted across the globe.
Just like Team Trees, Jimmy and Rober worked together to organise another collaborative YouTube event called Team Seas.
They wanted to raise $30 million for the Ocean Conservancy and The Ocean Cleanup to fund the removal of 30 million pounds (14,000,000 kg) of plastic and other waste from oceans, rivers, and beaches.
It was launched in October 2019, and as of January this year the project has raised a whopping $33,215,761.
Cataract Surgery
In his latest act, MrBeast paid for 1,000 blind or almost-blind people to get life-changing surgery to restore their sight.
He was inspired to help people with cataract surgeries after seeing the difference the simple procedure had on his own sight.
With the help of the non-profit eye care organization See, the team treated patients in Jamaica, Honduras, Namibia, Mexico, Indonesia, Brazil, Vietnam and Kenya.
Jimmy also gave $10,000 to a number of patients, bought one a Tesla, and even donated $50,000 to help with one person's college education.
His YouTube video featured touching before and after interviews with some of the patients.
When one patient was asked what the first thing he's excited to see post surgery, he replied: "My son. He's been my rock through all of this. Seeing him. Seeing his face. That's what I miss you know."
The man burst into tears when the bandages were removed and his son was standing there.
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