Which fighter has earned the most money over the course of their UFC career? We’ve crunched the numbers and have the answer for you. And the name at the top of the list probably won’t surprise many.
But, before we reveal the list, first some ground rules. Athletic commissions didn’t start releasing fighter purse info until 2004, so the info below only reflects money earned from UFC 46 and onward. Also, these are only the reported salaries plus Fight of the Night, Knockout of the Night and Submission of the Night bonuses that have been made public. Many top performing fighters get additional bonuses paid out to them that aren’t reported, plus the top guys get a cut of the pay-per-view buys for events that they headline (not to mention every fighter makes sponsorship money). Also, many athletic commissions don’t report fighter’s salary info, so for those we’ve estimated a fighter’s purse based on what they have earned in their other fights. Fighters with some estimated purses are marked with a * in the database. This data should still be considered very close to accurate, as most fighters’ purses remain rather steady from fight to fight (unless they ink a new contract in the meantime).
For the full salary info for all 600+ fighters who have competed in the UFC over the past seven years, click here. For now, here’s the UFC’s Millionaires Club, where Chuck Liddell ices them all:
(updated after TUF 13 Finale) (active UFC fighters in bold)
| 1 | Chuck Liddell* | $ 4,320,000 |
| 2 | Georges St-Pierre* | $ 3,102,000 |
| 3 | Randy Couture* | $ 3,045,000 |
| 4 | Rampage Jackson* | $ 2,715,000 |
| 5 | B.J. Penn* | $ 2,425,000 |
| 5 | Brock Lesnar | $ 2,425,000 |
| 7 | Tito Ortiz* | $ 2,255,000 |
| 8 | Anderson Silva* | $ 2,196,000 |
| 9 | Matt Hughes* | $ 1,945,000 |
| 10 | Michael Bisping* | $ 1,910,000 |
| 11 | Mirko Cro Cop* | $ 1,810,000 |
| 12 | Lyoto Machida* | $ 1,600,000 |
| 13 | Rashad Evans* | $ 1,507,000 |
| 14 | Forrest Griffin* | $ 1,432,000 |
| 15 | Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira* | $ 1,420,000 |
| 16 | Mauricio Rua* | $ 1,385,000 |
| 17 | Wanderlei Silva* | $ 1,285,000 |
| 18 | Frank Mir* | $ 1,108,000 |
| 19 | Diego Sanchez* | $ 1,087,000 |
| 20 | Dan Henderson* | $ 1,080,000 |
| 21 | Rich Franklin* | $ 1,036,000 |
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