The top internet celebrity MrBeast has made a huge fortune by selling snacks.

What is the end point for video-based content creators? For many top UP hosts with millions of followers, they aspire to become the Chinese version of MrBeast — as of July this year, he has accumulated over 1 billion followers across all platforms, making him the world's top internet celebrity.

In fact, compared with content tonality, follower count and other content-level metrics, what domestic UP hosts envy even more is his commercialization capability. Today, MrBeast is no longer just a content creator, he has also crossed over to the business field, establishing consumer brands covering burgers, chocolates and other categories, and becoming an entrepreneur with substantial physical business entities.

It can be said that, whether in terms of content creation or commercial monetization, MrBeast is the benchmark and role model for domestic UP hosts to learn from.

But nine years ago, MrBeast was just a clueless newcomer. What made this young man, who dropped out of community college and worked part-time in a restaurant kitchen, become the idol that UP hosts all over the world imitate and admire today?

The sudden rise of a once-depressed young man

For MrBeast, apart from the title of the world's top internet celebrity, he is also the most inspiring post-90s generation figure — a small-town youth who was once kicked out of his home by his parents and worked in a restaurant kitchen, has now become the founder of a company valued at 5 billion US dollars.

At that time, MrBeast was crazy and passionate about video creation. He maintained a creation intensity of 15 hours a day. To upgrade his hard drive and professional microphone, he would wash dishes and sort ingredients in the restaurant kitchen for a meager pay of only 8 US dollars per hour...

Even with such hard work, MrBeast achieved almost no results in the field of video creation in the five years from 2012 to 2017. The view count of his early videos hovered around a thousand, let alone advertising sponsorships, he did not even have basic influence.

The turning point came in January 2017. MrBeast spent 40 hours recording an extremely boring video, in which he counted from 1 to 100,000 facing the camera alone.

But this seemingly unwatchable video became a huge hit on YouTube: five days after its release, it reached 5.2 million views, and 6.6 million views seven days later, bringing him 258,000 new subscribers in the following two months.

It can be said that, "Counting to 100,000" made MrBeast an instant hit on the Internet, standing out from a group of mediocre content creators. More importantly, MrBeast found the secret to gaining popularity on YouTube.

At that time, to cope with the impact of Facebook in the video sector, YouTube improved its recommendation algorithm, increasing the weight of watch time and user satisfaction, while reducing the weight of metrics such as click-through rate.

This means that a 20-minute video that is watched 20% of its full length will have a higher recommendation weight than a 1-minute video that is watched in full, and clickbait titles are eliminated from the platform.

(Source: Internet) 

The logic of video recommendation was reconstructed, and MrBeast just caught the transition between the old and new algorithm recommendation systems. His curious videos of extreme challenges with suspense, such as "Counting to 100,000", got full support from the algorithm for recommendation.

This also kicked off MrBeast's "breakout mode" on the video track. It can be said that, this tiny change of the era opened a window for this small-town youth who dropped out of college.

MrBeast's full-speed breakout

"Counting to 100,000" unblocked MrBeast's full potential. Through data feedback, he figured out what users like to watch and what the platform algorithm prefers to recommend.

He then began to mass-produce this type of curious videos:

For example, MrBeast spent 4.56 million US dollars to invite 456 viewers to restore the hit South Korean film and TV IP *Squid Game*, and the final champion won a reward of 456,000 US dollars.

This video exceeded 100 million views just 3 days after its release, and reached a total of 976 million views by the end of 2021, making it the most viewed non-Shorts video at that time.

(Source: Internet) 

In the "$1 vs Sky-high Price" series of videos, the episode titled *$1 vs $100,000,000 House!* set a record of 60 million views within 24 hours, which was the highest single-day view count for non-music videos on YouTube at that time.

For the video *7 Days Stranded On An Island*, MrBeast and his team members participated in the challenge in person, demonstrating how to build a shelter and find filtered water sources. This 20-minute video gained 533 million views.

From these videos, it is not hard to see that, the reasons for MrBeast's huge popularity can be summed up as: extreme challenges + simple concepts + real execution.

Extreme challenges arouse users' curiosity and willingness to click, such as counting from zero to 100,000, surviving in the wild for 7 days, users will wonder whether he can count to 100,000, if there are any mistakes in the process, and how exactly one can survive in the wild...

Simple concepts allow everyone to understand what the video is about at a glance, like the $1 vs $100 million house, leading users to peek at what a $100 million house really looks like.

Real execution means that MrBeast and his team members actually do everything shown in the videos, for example, in the *Squid Game* video, MrBeast restored the game scenes in the original movie one to one.

Against the background that YouTube's algorithm shifted its focus from click volume to watch time, MrBeast stood at the forefront of the times with this unpretentious strategy. His subscriber count soared from 1 million in 2017 to 400 million in June 2025, making him the world's top internet celebrity.

Achieving three-stage rocket super evolution

Compared with MrBeast's follower count and global influence, what makes other UP hosts even more envious is his commercial expansion.

Different from the common perception that UP hosts make profits through paid subscriptions, traffic sharing and embedded advertisements, video creation is only the tip of the iceberg of MrBeast's entire business landscape.

In fact, MrBeast does not make any profit from his media business at all, and even suffers serious losses: in 2024, his media business recorded a loss of nearly 80 million US dollars with a sales volume of about 250 million US dollars.

The real function of videos is not to monetize directly. Through high-quality videos with a single production cost of up to 4.5 million US dollars, MrBeast attracts a large number of users around the world and gains their trust and favor. Survey data shows that 70% of YouTube users have a favorable impression of MrBeast.

It can be said that, the strategic positioning of the media business, which is to produce high-quality videos regardless of cost, has brought MrBeast massive traffic and user favorability.

This leads to the next link in MrBeast's business landscape — monetization.

At present, MrBeast owns the chocolate and snack brand Feastables, the virtual restaurant brand MrBeast Burger, and the ready-to-eat snack pack brand Lunchly, and plans to enter sectors including vitamins, protein powder and personal care products.

(Source: Bangbuy Global Official Website) 

All these brands have several things in common: first, the price of such products is relatively low; second, they are all daily fast-moving consumer goods; third, whether it is snacks or burgers, there is no high technical threshold, and product differentiation is relatively small.

This means that, when MrBeast recommends his own fast-moving consumer goods, the migration cost for users to make a purchase is almost zero, as users will not mind buying these products from him instead of other merchants.

Data shows that in 2024, Feastables achieved a sales volume of about 250 million US dollars, with a profit of over 20 million US dollars, and its profit is expected to reach 300 million US dollars in 2026.

In addition to laying out fast-moving consumer goods, MrBeast is also seeking a second growth curve for his business. In February this year, MrBeast acquired Step, a banking App for teenagers with 7 million users, renamed it "MRBEAST FINANCIAL", and officially entered the financial service industry.

It can be said that MrBeast has now formed a self-driven business matrix: video media serves as the core foundation, providing traffic and user favorability; fast-moving consumer brands such as Feastables realize commercial conversion based on the traffic, generating the vast majority of revenue and profits; the new business MRBEAST FINANCIAL brings a second growth curve for MrBeast.

For domestic UP hosts, the enlightenment from MrBeast is that: The end of self-media is not necessarily embedded advertisements and platform revenue sharing. Instead, it may be precipitating personal IP into brand assets, and further growing into a company with substantial physical businesses. This requires continuous content innovation capability and long-term maintenance of user trust in the brand.

This article is from the WeChat Official Account "Siku Finance", written by Vincent, and authorized for release by 36Kr.