Tyler ‘Ninja’ Blevins is widely regarded as the world’s most famous gamer. A former professional Halo player for the likes of Cloud9, Team Liquid, and Luminosity Gaming, Ninja is now a record-breaking streamer.
Mainly streaming himself playing Fortnite, Ninja smashed multiple viewership records for videogame streaming such as the most hours viewed and highest concurrent viewers on a single stream. He also became the most followed streamer on Twitch, peaking at over 14 million followers. He didn’t quite reach those heights at Mixer, but who knows where he’ll go next.
Despite being widely known as a Fortnite streamer, Ninja began his streaming career playing PUBG and H1Z1. He has also dabbled in other battle royale titles such as Apex Legends, and has also recently played Minecraft and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare.
Ninja is 28 years old and, despite being born in Detroit, grew up in Grayslake, Illinois. Before becoming a pro Halo player and streaming superstar, Ninja had a job working at a Noodles & Company restaurant.
His wife and manager, Jessica Blevins, is one of the reasons behind Ninja’s massive success. She has previously been quoted as saying that her ambition was to make her husband a “household name” beyond the circles of gaming and streaming.
Ninja’s popularity has seen him play with a number of celebrity teammates. A landmark moment in recent gaming history was his famous livestream back in 2018, during which he competed in a four-man Fortnite squad alongside American football player JuJu Smith-Schuster and superstar rappers Drake and Travis Scott.
A few months later, Ninja assembled another star-studded squad by playing alongside three Tottenham Hotspur footballers Harry Kane, Dele Alli, and Kieran Trippier.
Here we answer some of the most frequently asked questions about the most popular streamer in the world.
WHAT IS NINJA’S NET WORTH?
Ninja’s net worth is estimated to be approximately $15 million (that’s just over £12 million), according to Celebrity Net Worth. This takes into account his revenue from streaming, his YouTube channel, merch sales, and his various sponsorship deals.
However, recent reports suggest that Ninja’s exclusivity deal with Mixer was worth upwards of $20 million dollars, and Forbes suggests he earned $17 million in total during 2019. Both of these reports would suggest his net worth is higher than $15 million.
Whatever the exact figure, it’s a huge sum.
These numbers exclude the hundreds of thousands of dollars that Ninja has raised and donated to various charities over the years. For example, a single livestream in aid of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in 2018 saw him raise a massive $325,000 (£263,000). In 2019, Ninja donated $15,000 to MrBeast’s Team Trees campaign, and $10,000 to the Wounded Warriors Project.
HOW MUCH DOES NINJA EARN?
As the most famous gamer on the planet, Ninja certainly has a fair few streams of income that earn a healthy sum. He has previously revealed in television interviews that he would potentially earn over $500,000 (£406,000) a month from Twitch subscribers alone, not to mention the donations he receives throughout his streams. He once received a one-off, anonymous donation during a livestream of $40,000.
There was also Ninja’s first switch in streaming platforms, with Microsoft offering a lucrative deal to tempt him away from Twitch to begin exclusively streaming on their now defunct service, Mixer. Again, an exact amount was not officially disclosed, but recent reports suggest that the multi-year deal was worth between $20-30 million. His wife, Jessica, confirmed that long negotiations over his Twitch contract was one of the reasons Ninja moved to Mixer.
It was also rumoured that Ninja was paid $1 million to stream EA’s battle royale title Apex Legends when the game was released. The coverage the game received from featuring on Ninja’s popular stream catapulted it into popularity.
Along with the income from streaming, Ninja also has a YouTube channel where he posts highlights and clips from his streams. With 22.4 million subscribers and nearly two billion total video views, it’s likely that Ninja has generated approximately $6 million (£4.8 million) from his YouTube channel since starting it in 2011.
Another big source of income are the numerous sponsorship deals Ninja has. Some of the biggest brand names to be associated with Ninja include Red Bull, Uber Eats, NZXT, and most recently, Adidas. Although the exact amount he earns from these sponsors hasn’t been disclosed, it’s safe to assume that, collectively, the figure will be in the millions.
Ninja also has a book on sale, titled ‘Get Good – My Ultimate Guide to Gaming’. This will like bring in some healthy profit over the festive period, as will his line of official Ninja merchandise. This includes clothing, bedding, and even his trademark headband. Sales from all these products will add to that bumper net worth.
WHAT IS NINJA’S STREAMING SETUP?
Like most big-name streamers, Ninja has a top-of-the-range setup for his streams, featuring two PCs (one for playing games and one for running his stream), high-end gaming gear, microphones, lighting, and cameras to create a professional-looking stream.
To get those Victory Royales, he uses an Alienware AW2518H monitor, a Corsair K70 Rapidfire mechanical keyboard, a Finalmouse Air58 Ninja CBR Edition gaming mouse, and gets his audio through a Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro headset.
Get Ninja’s setup now:
You’ll also notice him sitting in a Ninja Edition Maxnomic gaming chair during his streams.
The build for his gaming PC includes an Intel I9-9900K processor, EVGA GeForce RTX 2080TI graphics card, 64GB G.Skill Tridentz RGB series RAM, and an ASUS ROG Maximus XI Hero motherboard.
To game at the level Ninja does with this standard of equipment doesn’t come cheap. With all the gear and the PC build, it’ll likely set you back anywhere between $4500- $5,000 (£3600-£4000), depending on what deals you can find.
The production of his streams relies on a Blackmagic control panel, an Electro-Voice RE20 microphone, and a Logitech Brio 4K webcam. There are also a number of Blackmagic URSA Mini 4K cameras dotted around his streaming room for different angles. This all goes through his second PC, powered by an Intel Core I9-7940X processor.
WHAT ARE NINJA’S SETTINGS?
We’ve seen some insane clips since Fortnite was released of Ninja getting eliminations that you sometimes can’t quite believe. Ninja uses an array of custom settings to outbuild, outplay, and outgun his opponents.
WHAT ARE NINJA’S FORTNITE SETTINGS?
Ninja plays with these sensitivity settings:
- X Sensitivity: 0.10
- Y Sensitivity: 0.07
- ADS Sensitivity: 0.30
- Scope Sensitivity: 0.30
- Mouse DPI: 800
- Polling Rate: 500Hz
For his display settings, Ninja usually plays with a ‘Far’ view distance. He turns all other graphic options like shadows and motion blur off and plays on “Fullscreen” window mode with the maximum resolution and 3D resolution of 1920 x 1080. He has been known to play with textures and effects at either ‘Low’ or ‘Epic’, although he has most recently been seen with them at ‘Low’.
Keybinds wise, he uses standard keys for movement, including SPACE to jump and C to crouch. But he uses a combination of Q and LEFT SHIFT on the keyboard and his two thumb buttons on his gaming mouse to select his builds. He uses F to edit.
In combat, he aims and fires with his mouse, reloads with R, uses items and interacts with E, and has his weapon slots set out like this:
- Harvest Tool: 1
- Weapon Slot 1: 2
- Weapon Slot 2: 3
- Weapon Slot 3: 4
- Weapon Slot 4: Z
- Weapon Slot 5: X
- Trap Slot: T
IS NINJA ON TWITCH?
No, Ninja does not stream on Twitch anymore, but there are rumours he might return. Ninja had moved to Mixer in August 2019, but now that Microsoft has confirmed it’s shutting the platform down, Ninja is free to stream where he pleases.
During the interim period, Facebook Gaming reportedly tried to tempt the streamer over by offering him double his Mixer contract, but he apparently turned that offer down.
While Ninja’s Twitch channel is dormant at the moment, he recently updated his bio to state he’s playing Valorant and Fortnite – the first big change since he left the platform in 2019.
Ninja didn’t exactly leave Twitch on the best of terms, though. Following his departure, the purple platform placed ads and links to other streamers on Ninja’s dormant channel, landing them in some pretty hot water. One of the ads in question took people to a rogue stream in which someone was broadcasting pornography. This sparked an angry response from Ninja that led to Twitch removing all of the ads on his page.
IS NINJA ON MIXER?
No, Ninja is not on Mixer anymore after Microsoft pulled the plug on the service. He’s still looking for a new home to stream on.
DOES NINJA HAVE HIS OWN FORTNITE SKIN?
Yes, Ninja has a skin in Fortnite that’s modelled on him. The Ninja skin, which costs 1,500 V-Bucks, looks exactly like the streamer and even has his trademark headband.
He’s not the only streamer to get his own skin, though. Epic Games announced one of Twitch’s biggest female streamers, Kathleen ‘Loserfruit’ Belsten, and Spanish streamer David ‘TheGregF Canovas, will also see their faces in game soon.
