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PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds has staged many thrilling events since the game first released and its competitive scene is still battling it out for high prize pools. But, who tops the list of highest earning professional players as we head into 2020?
PUBG burst onto the scene in March 2017 with the vision to take its battle royale concept to the mainstream and it has certainly achieved that, but it’s now going toe-to-toe with Fortnite Battle Royale, Apex Legends, Call of Duty and others in the ever-growing BR market.
As more and more Twitch streamers and professional players started playing the game, the interest in the game mode surged and so to have the prize pools. During the first two years of competition, over $10 million worth of prize money has been awarded to successful gamers.
The competitions stepped up a notch when FACEIT announced their official integration of PUBG in September 2018 and fans have been treated to some incredible moments since, with a stunning, game-winning 1v6 clutch play at the PUBG FACEIT Global Summit 2019 from Sun ‘Cpt’ Yu-Ze to clinch victory.
A lot of changes have been made to PUBG since the game first launched in 2017. The largest prize pool ever seen for a PUBG competitive event was the 2019 Global Championship, where a whopping $4 million was up for grabs.
This breaks the record set by the 2018 Invitational for the largest prize pool in PUBG competitive history.
The eventual winners were team Gen.G, whose South Korean roster – consisting of Chelator, Loki, Esther, taemin, Pio – took home a mind-blowing $2 million between them.
The four Chinese competitive players shared winnings of $430,000 between them, with the statistics below showing just how much their performance at that event affected the worldwide standings of winningest pro players.
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Thanks to esportsEarnings, fans can see which of their favorite players have pocketed the most cash from their tournament performances.
Top 20 highest earning PUBG players
| Position | Name | Nationality | Earnings |
|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Loki | S. Korea | $758,171 |
| #2 | Esth3r | S. Korea | $676,630 |
| #3 | Taemin | S. Korea | $651,742 |
| #4 | Pio | S. Korea | $640,898 |
| #5 | GodV | China | $433,713 |
| #6 | Forever | China | $388,661 |
| #7 | ZGGO1 | China | $384,850 |
| #8 | xxxLu | China | $375,036 |
| #9 | fuzzface | Sweden | $360,090 |
| #10 | mxey | Finland | $352,890 |
| #11 | ubah | Russia | $341,299 |
| #12 | Aitzy | Norway | $298,190 |
| #13 | Sambty | Finland | $247,140 |
| #14 | Jeemzz | Norway | $235,890 |
| #15 | Ibiza | Holland | $234,390 |
| #16 | lionkk | China | $205,477 |
| #17 | silentBT_ | China | $181,549 |
| #18 | ziaohaixxxx | China | $179,906 |
| #19 | Jembty | Finland | $176,184 |
| #20 | xiaorong | China | $163,976 |
UPDATED: December 26, 2019
The table saw some drastic changes in November, with multiple players shuffling positions, but December was a pretty quiet month for the game’s competitive scene.
Leading the way is still Loki with a total of $758,171, followed by two fellow South Koreans Esth3r ($676,630) and Taemin ($651,742). With the distance at the top so large, it might take more than one big victory from those beneath Loki for somebody to catch up.
What’s coming up for PUBG?
The PUBG Global Series is the biggest thing fans of this competitive scene have got to look forward to in 2020, with three sets of qualifiers taking place throughout the course of the year, building towards the PGC in November.
The graphic below shows when each event will be kicking off, starting in Berlin during April.
Check out other top 20 Highest Earning players in various esports: