Taylor Swift sold over 2 million tickets to her Eras tour on November 15, the most ever for an artist in a single day on Ticketmaster, and enough to crash parts of the company’s site. Beyoncé Knowles won her 32nd Grammy award, more than any other musician in history. Rihanna performed one of the most watched Super Bowl halftime shows in history, in front of more than 121 million viewers.
Women celebrities are making history, and along the way taking control of their own fame and fortune. Altogether 15 stars made this year’s Forbes list of America’s Richest Self-Made Women. Worth a combined $10.8 billion, these celebrities include some of the most well-known and hardest-working performers, artists and producers—folks like Reese Witherspoon, who is executive producer of several hit series and stars in another; Dolly Parton, who’s been busy with TV specials, new books and new product lines this past year; and yes, Taylor Swift, who is in the middle of her first tour in five years and her biggest ever: 52 performances in 20 cities over 145 days.
To no surprise, Swift added more to her fortune than any other celebrity this past year, jumping 14 spots in the ranks to No. 34, up from No. 48. The $170 million increase to her net worth is tied to the release of her No. 1 album Midnights and the launch of her tour, which kicked off in March. It’s a labor of love for Swift: “I’ve just never been this happy in my life,” she recently said on-stage. Her net worth should jump even higher on next year’s list as the tour continues; she gets a cut of all merchandise sold at each concert.
Also moving up the ranks is Beyoncé, who began her Renaissance tour in May; she’s worth $540 million, $90 million more than last year, and now ranks No. 48, up from No. 61.
The only famous newcomer to debut this year is showrunner Shonda Rhimes, thanks to the success of her long-running ABC shows like Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal and newer Netflix hits like Bridgerton and Inventing Anna. Her latest, Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story, debuted on Netflix on May 4.
Making the list is no easy feat. The 2022 list featured 17 celebrities with a minimum net worth of $215 million, compared to this year’s threshold of $225 million. Sandra Bullock, Maria Sharapova and Kris Jenner all dropped out of the ranks, unable to keep up. While Kris Jenner fell below the cut, largely due to Forbes’ lower valuation of her daughter Kim Kardashian’s unicorn shapewear brand Skims, Kim and sister Kylie Jenner still appear in the ranks. In fact Kylie, at age 25, is the youngest self-made woman on the top 100 list, a title she’s held since 2018 when she first made her debut at age 20.
Oprah Winfrey
Winfrey reportedly purchased nearly 900 acres of land in Maui earlier this year, adding to her portfolio of 13 properties on the Hawaiian islands plus real estate in California and Wyoming. The media mogul returned to her alma mater, Tennessee State University, for the first time since 1987 to deliver the commencement address in May. She’s producing a Stephen Speilberg-directed remake of The Color Purple, the 1985 film for which she earned an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress.
Rihanna
Rihanna’s Super Bowl halftime show in February attracted 121 million viewers, making it one of the most watched in history. It was her first live performance in more than five years and came two months after she released new music for the Black Panther: Wakanda Forever soundtrack. She is launching a new Fenty X Puma partnership and has an estimated 30% stake in lingerie line Savage X Fenty. The bulk of her fortune comes from Fenty Beauty, the makeup line she co-owns with LVMH and whose sales doubled in 2022.
Kim Kardashian
The TV star and business mogul is pushing forward in both realms. She’ll join the season 12 cast of FX show American Horror Story, premiering later this year. Her private equity firm, SKKY Partners, headed by a former Carlyle Group exec, is reportedly trying to raise a $1 billion fund to invest in consumer and media companies. Kardashian, who launched skin care line SKKN by Kim last summer, still owes much of her ten-figure wealth to a 35% stake in shapewear label Skims. Forbes lowered the valuation of that brand in line with public markets, knocking Kardashian’s fortune down by $600 million.
Taylor Swift
The ninth-highest-earning entertainer of 2022 had a massive year thanks to the success of her tenth studio album, Midnights, and the announcement of her Eras tour, which kicked off in March. A record 2 million-plus tickets were sold by Ticketmaster on a single November day. Her fortune is up $170 million thanks to the album and start of the tour. She will make much more as she performs on the road and will also get a cut from all 52 performances and merchandise sales.
Kylie Jenner
The social media star continues to pump her followers—including 390 million Instagrammers—with endorsements of products like Glow water (she recently became a spokesperson) and ads for Kylie Cosmetics items including products sold in British luxury retailer Selfridges and a new line inspired by DC Comics’ Batman. In March, Jenner’s cosmetics brand lit up Dubai’s Burj Khalifa skyscraper with her face to celebrate its launch in the Middle East. Jenner owns an estimated 44.1% of Kylie Cosmetics; she sold 51% of it to French beauty giant Coty for $600 million in 2020.
Madonna
Until January, Madonna had agreed to co-write and direct a biopic about herself with Ozark’s Emmy-winning star Julia Garner cast as the singer. The production was shelved after the queen of pop announced her Celebration tour, which she’ll kick off in July. The show is dedicated to Madonna’s four decades in the music industry.
Beyoncé Knowles
Knowles released her seventh studio album, Renaissance, last year, which helped her break the record for the most Grammy wins in history, with 32 trophies. Her clothing line, Ivy Park, severed its partnership with Adidas in March. The singer announced a couture collection with fashion house Balmain that’s inspired by the new album. In May, she embarked on the Renaissance world tour, her first solo tour in seven years. She and husband Jay-Z reportedly purchased a $200 million Malibu mansion, the most expensive in California history.
Celine Dion
The Canada-born chanteuse has Sin City to thank for her fortune; earnings from her Las Vegas residency account for the majority of her wealth. But it’s unclear when Dion will return to the Strip. In December 2022, she revealed she is suffering from a rare neurological disorder that affects her ability to sing. She continues to release music; She has contributed five new songs to a rom-com soundtrack that was released in May.
Judy Sheindlin
In 2021, the longtime TV judge ended her CBS show Judge Judy and moved to Amazon Freevee, where she now helms Judy Justice. The judicial series’ first season won a Daytime Emmy. Sheindlin is expanding her fiery legal brand on the platform with two new series: Tribunal Justice, which premieres in June, and Justice on Trial, which was greenlit in May.
Dolly Parton
At age 77, the country music icon is showing no signs of slowing down. In the last year, she’s had two TV specials, published a novel (and companion album) with author James Patterson, a children’s book holder and added fresh lines of branded baked goods and pet products. Coming up: a 30-song rock album due in November. The main source of her wealth is her Tennessee theme park, Dollywood, which has benefited from a post-pandemic tourism boom.
Reese Witherspoon
Witherspoon appears both in front of and behind the camera this year. She is executive producer of hit series Daisy Jones & the Six and Tiny Beautiful Things, and stars in The Morning Show, which was renewed for a fourth season in May. Blackstone’s Candle Media purchased a majority stake in her media company, Hello Sunshine, in 2021; she still owns at least 18%.
Barbara Streisand
The acclaimed singer and actor last year released Barbra Streisand Live at the Bon Soir, an album of her earliest live recordings made in 1962; it was originally intended as her debut solo record. Its release is part of a new retrospective from Streisand; her long-awaited memoir, My Name is Barbra, will hit bookstores in November. Her wealth comes from a lifetime of performing, plus a Malibu compound worth about as many millions as she is years old.
Ellen DeGeneres
After putting an end to her daytime TV show in May 2022, the comedian has been busy flipping homes. Forbes found six properties that she has sold and three she has bought since the final taping. That includes the estate she purchased for $70 million in January in Carpinteria, near Santa Barbara, where she lives with her spouse, Portia de Rossi.
Serena Williams
The tennis ace announced in August that she would be hanging up her racket to focus on her family, bringing to a close a career in which she earned nearly $95 million in prize money, more than twice as much as any other female athlete ever. The bulk of her fortune comes from endorsements and other endeavors such as her investing firm, Serena Ventures. She recently launched a TV and film production company and is a cofounder of Will Perform, which sells pain-relief and muscle-care products. She is pregnant with her second child.
Shonda Rhimes
Rhimes brought in more than $2 billion to ABC’s parent company, Disney, with hits such as the long-running medical drama Grey’s Anatomy. She topped that with hit shows for Netflix including Bridgerton and its spin-off, Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story, which premiered in May. The Hollywood mogul’s real estate portfolio includes a New York City apartment decorated like the sets of the royal period romance series, and a Westport, Connecticut, mansion she purchased from Melissa and Doug Bernstein, the founders of the Melissa & Doug toy company. “I never worried that I deserve the money,” Rhimes said in 2021. “I deserve every penny I make.”
