Top 10 Billionaires of the World at A Glance

Imagine a billion dollars! A $100 billion! Find it a little surreal, don’t you? Wondering how many zeros are in a billion? Well, let me answer that for you, a billion has 9 zeros, and it looks something like this: 1,000,000,000.

Have you ever wondered exactly how rich is the world’s richest person? The wealth held by the top 10 richest people in the world is astronomical. The total number of billionaires in 2021 is 2755, and the total wealth that all the world’s billionaires hold together is $13.1 trillion.

As always, we are all curious about the life, wins, and losses that made the top 10 billionaires rumble. Are you ready to learn from the top 10 richest men in the world? In time-honored tradition, Forbes has released their 35th Annual World’s Richest List. 

Forbes’ the world’s richest list has been curated by evaluating stock prices and exchange rates from March 2021 onwards. For this list, we will look at their net worth as of September 2021. Without further ado, let’s dive into the world of the top 10 billionaires.

NameAge (As of 2021)CountryNet Worth (in billions)
Jeff Bezos57USA$195.7
Elon Musk49USA$193.7
Bernard Arnault72France$181.6
Bill Gates65USA$131.3
Mark Zuckerberg36USA$122.6
Larry Page48USA$120.2
Larry Ellison76USA$116.6
Sergey Brin47USA$115.8
Warren Buffett90USA$100.3
Steve Ballmer65USA$95.7
Mukesh Ambani64India$94.1
Top 10 Richest people at a glance (as of September 2021)

Jeff Bezos:

  • Net worth: $195.7 billion 
  • Industry: Technology
  • Age (As of 2021): 57
  • Education: Princeton University
  • Country: USA
Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos is quite the enigma. Not only is he a billionaire, but he’s also been at the top of the list of the top 10 billionaires for 4 long years. Jeff founded Amazon in 1994 and took it public in 1997. 

Amazon started as a humble online book-selling portal. And today, it is the largest consumer-centric online selling portal. Amazon saw massive growth in its revenue, which grew by 38% to $386 billion during the pandemic. The biggest retailer in the world offers everything from needles to now selling their own branded over-the-counter medicine. 

Along with his stake in Amazon, Jeff owns Blue Origin, an aerospace company that is developing rockets for commercial use, and The Washington Post, a widely circulated daily newspaper. 

Elon Musk:

  • Net worth: $193.7 billion 
  • Industry: Automotive
  • Age (As of 2021): 50
  • Education: University of Pennsylvania
  • Country: USA

Elon Musk started his journey in 1995 by founding Zip2, a navigational software along with his brother, Kimbal Musk, and friend, Greg Kauri. Since then, En has founded PayPal, Neuralink, The Boring Company, and SpaceX. SpaceX develops commercial rockets and currently values at $74 billion.

Elon Musk

In 2004, Elon became a major funder for Tesla and currently serves as its CEO. Tesla is an electric vehicle company that announced its first “cybertruck” in 2019. Tesla’s stock saw a growth of 705% in 2020, the company made the jump to S&P 500 in the same month.

Elon joined his fellow top 10 richest people in the world in 2021 for the first time.

Bernard Arnault:

  • Net worth: $181.6 billion 
  • Industry: Fashion & Retail
  • Age (As of 2021): 72
  • Education: École Polytechnique
  • Country: France
Bernard Arnault

Bernard Arnault is the chair and CEO of the largest luxury goods company, LVMH. He owns a staggering 47% stake in LVMH. The luxury conglomerate saw a 30% surge in Q1 revenue over 2020. 

Brands such as Louis Vuitton, Bulgari, Christian Dior, Hennessey, and Sephora fall under the LVMH umbrella. Arnault is a major shareholder in Christian Dior SE. LVMH acquired American jeweler Tiffany and Co. in 2021 for $15.8 billion. Another acquisition saw LVMH shelling out $3.8 billion for Belmond, a luxury hospitality group. 

Bernard is a Frenchman who started his journey at his father’s construction business, Ferret-Savinel. In 1979, he converted the business into a real estate company, Fenriel Inc. Fenriel Inc. helped Bernard buy Christian Dior for $15 million in 1985. 

In 1987, Bernard became a majority shareholder in LVMH. He became the chair and CEO of LVMH in 1989.

Bernard has been a part of the top 10 richest men in the world for years running.

Bill Gates:

  • Net worth: $131.3 billion 
  • Industry: Technology
  • Age (As of 2021): 65
  • Education: Harvard University (dropped out)
  • Country: USA
Bill Gates

Bill Gates, along with Paul Allen, founded Microsoft in 1975. Today, Microsoft is the largest software company in the world. Gates became Microsoft’s chair in 2008 and stepped down in March 2020. Along with his 1% stake in Microsoft, Gates also owns stakes in Canadian National Railway and Deere and Co. 

Bill Gates has garnered respect and appreciation for his philanthropic efforts via the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the world’s largest charitable private foundation. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has spent billions on fighting poverty and disease throughout the world.

Bill Gates has been a part of the top ten richest people in the world for 22 years in a row.

Mark Zuckerberg:

  • Net worth: $122.6 billion 
  • Industry: Technology
  • Age (As of 2021): 37
  • Education: Harvard University (dropped out)
  • Country: USA
Mark Zuckerberg

The Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, has garnered quite the stardom ever since launching his social networking site. Facebook went public in 2012, but Zuckerberg still owns 15% of the stock. Facebook had 2.8 billion monthly active users in January 2021. 

The pandemic saw Facebook shares surge by 80% as its user base saw a massive jump. As Facebook is a free portal, the company makes its revenue through advertising. Facebook acquired Instagram in 2012 and WhatsApp in 2014, respectively.

In 2015, Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan Co-founded the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. The initiative aims to use technology to help bring about societal change. The couple pledged to give away 99% of their Facebook stock over their lifetime.

Mark Zuckerberg is the youngest person on the top 10 billionaires list.

Larry Page:

  • Net worth:  $120.2 billion 
  • Industry: Technology
  • Age (As of 2021): 48
  • Education: Stanford University
  • Country: USA
Larry Page

Larry Page is yet another name on the top 10 billionaires list, who made his fortune in technology. He co-founded Google along with Sergei Brin in 1998. Larry served as CEO of Alphabet until 2019. Page and Brin also invented Google’s PageRank algorithm.

In 2005, Google acquired Android Inc. and launched its first phone using the Android Operating System in 2008. Google further expanded itself by purchasing YouTube in 2006.

Page is a founding investor in Planetary Resources, a space exploration company. He is also investing in flying car startups such as Opener.

Larry Page may have joined the esteemed ranks of the top 10 richest men in the world in 2019, but he became a billionaire at 30.

Larry Ellison:

  • Net worth: $116.6 billion 
  • Industry: Technology
  • Age (As of 2021): 77
  • Education: University of Chicago
  • Country: USA
Larry Ellison

Larry Ellison rose to fame as the co-founder of Oracle Systems Corporation in 1977. He owns a 35% stake in the company. It is the second-largest software company in the world. Its pioneer software, Oracle, is a database management software. 

Along with Oracle, Oracle systems have also developed several cloud computing programs. In a series of acquisitions, the largest one yet was for NetSuite in 2016 for $9.3 billion. In 2018, Ellison joined Tesla’s board. The 2021 growth surge in Tesla gave a massive boost to Ellison’s net worth.

His philanthropic efforts include donating millions of dollars towards medical research. He recently donated $200 million for a new Cancer Research Center.

Larry Ellison has been a part of the top 10 billionaires list for 13 years running.

Sergey Brin:

  • Net worth:  $115.8 billion 
  • Industry: Technology
  • Age (As of 2021): 48
  • Education: Stanford University
  • Country: USA
Sergey Brin

Sergey Brin co-founded Google with Larry Page in 1998. Google went public in 2004 and traded under the Alphabet name. Brin acted as Alphabet’s President (parent company of Google) before stepping down in 2015.

Curtailing his public appearances, Brin largely focussed on Alphabet’s moonshot laboratory, X. The focus of research conducted at X is on products such as Waymo self-driving cars.

Brin has spent most of his philanthropic effort towards finding a cure for Parkinson’s. He has partnered with The Michael J. Fox Foundation towards developing drugs against the genetic contributors to Parkinson’s.

Sergey Brin became a member of the top 10 billionaires in 2021 with Google co-founder Larry Page.

Warren Buffett:

  • Net worth: $100.3 billion 
  • Industry: Finance & Investments
  • Age (As of 2021): 91
  • Education: Columbia Business School
  • Country: USA
Warren Buffett

One of the most successful investors of all time, Warren Buffett saw a growth of $28 billion in his net worth this year. Buffet rose to prominence as a value investor when he first bought shares in Berkshire Hathaway in 1962.

By mid-2021, Berkshire Hathaway was trading at $410,000 per share. Warren Buffett owns a major list of companies that include the likes of Dairy Queen, Duracell, and Kraft Heinz.

In the last 15 years, Buffet has given away almost $41 billion to philanthropic efforts. Buffet also launched The Giving Pledge along with Bill Gates in 2010. The Giving Pledge aims to convince the rich to donate at least half of their wealth to charity.

Steve Ballmer:

  • Net worth: $95.7 billion 
  • Industry: Technology
  • Age (As of 2021): 65
  • Education: Stanford (dropped out)
  • Country: USA
Steve Ballmer

Steve Ballmer was the third employee to join Microsoft. Steve studied with Bill Gates at Harvard and served as Microsoft’s CEO from 2000 to 2014. 

Steve oversaw Microsoft through the dot-com crash and led the company towards and through diversifications such as developing Xbox and Microsoft’s foray into search engines, Bing! Under Steve’s leadership, Microsoft acquired Skype in 2011. 

After he retired from Microsoft, Steve purchased the L.A. Clippers basketball team for $2 billion.

Steve’s philanthropic efforts include donating over $2 billion to donor-advised funds with a focus on finding a solution to American poverty. He has invested heavily in Social Solutions, a platform working on developing technology for nonprofits and government agencies.

Steve Ballmer has recently joined the top 10 richest men in the world.

Mukesh Ambani:

  • Net worth: $94.1 billion 
  • Industry: Diversified
  • Age (As of 2021): 64
  • Education: Stanford (dropped out)
  • Country: India
Mukesh Ambani

Mukesh Ambani started his journey towards being one of the top 10 richest men in the world in 1981. He started working in his family’s business, Reliance Industries Limited, which was then run by his late father, Dhirubhai Ambani. 

Like many of the world’s richest, Mukesh is a dropout of Stanford. Mukesh stayed back in India to help his father expand their growing petrochemical business. In 2002, after Dhirubhai’s death, a legal battle ensued between brothers, Mukesh and Anil Ambani. 

In the dispute’s aftermath, Mukesh ended up with the textile, petrochemical, refining, and oil and gas businesses. Currently, Mukesh Ambani chairs Reliance Industries. 

Mukesh Ambani became a part of the top 10 richest people in the world in 2021 after his last stint in 2011.

Summing it up:

Do you have a billion-dollar idea? And do you have the grit and conviction to see it through? When you stick with an idea through thick and thin, especially when no one else seems to believe in it, that is when your inner billionaire needs to come out and play!

We all know that playing the game isn’t easy, but you need to believe in yourself because if you won’t champion your idea, why would anyone else? 

Each of the world’s top ten billionaires has ambition and drive to succeed. The drive isn’t primarily towards wealth creation itself. It is towards playing the game and succeeding. According to Forbes, a new billionaire is being added to this group of uber-rich every 17 hours. You can be next. Let us get working on that idea!

Frequently Asked Questions:

Who is the richest man in Asia?

Mukesh Ambani is the richest man in Asia.

Who is the richest woman in the world?

Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, the L’Oreal heiress.

How many billionaires are in the world?

According to Forbes, there are 2,755 billionaires as of September 2021.

Who is the richest person in the world in 2021?

In real-time evaluation based upon the stock exchange, there is a toss-up between Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and Bernard Arnault for the first place.

Who is the 10th richest man in the world?

As of September 2021, it is Steve Ballmer.

Who is the youngest billionaire in the world?

Kevin David Lehmann, a 19-year-old German drugstore heir.

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