Taylor Swift Is Officially the Highest-Paid Musician in the World

Taylor Swift '1989' World Tour - Sydney
Photograph by Mark Metcalfe — Getty Images

One of the world’s most famous musicians is now also the richest.

Singer and performer Taylor Swift topped Forbes‘ list of the world’s highest-paid musicians this year, after earning a whopping $170 million from June 2015 to June 2016. Her success is largely attributable to both her 1989 tour and product endorsements, including deals with Keds, Diet Coke, and Apple, according to Forbes.

Snagging the No. 2 spot on the musicians list is boy-band One Direction, at $110 million. Adele came in at No. 3 with $80.5 million, and following her were singers Madonna and Rihanna with $76.5 million and $75 million, respectively.

 

Although women rounded out the list’s top five, only seven were among the top 30. And unfortunately for them, this particular gender gap doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon.

“When it comes to the relative earning power of these artists, we have a way to go until we see the gender gap eliminated,” attorney Lori Landew of Fox Rothschild first told Forbes.

Despite this, climbing to the top doesn’t seem to be a problem for Swift: Earlier this year, she also made the No. 1 spot on Forbes’ lists of highest-paid celebrities of 2016.

See who made the 2025 Fortune Most Powerful Women list. The definitive ranking of the women at the top of the global business world tells us both who wields power today and who is poised to climb even higher tomorrow.