How Much Did The Highest-Paid Female Athletes Make Just From Playing in 2023?
How Much Did The Highest-Paid Female Athletes Make Just From Playing in 2023?
Most rankings of the highest-paid women in sports include endorsements. But what if we just look at earnings from playing the sport itself?
Who was the highest-paid female athlete in 2023?
The answer to that question isn’t as straightforward as it seems.
In their annual rankings, outlets such as Sportico and Forbes publish lists of the best compensated athletes in women’s sports using a methodology that combines both their on-field salary and prize money with their off-field earnings through endorsements.
By Sportico’s accounting, American tennis superstar Coco Gauff topped the charts by earning $22.7 million in 2023, which would seem comparable at a glance to some of the highest-paid players in the NFL (that’s more than 2023 MVP favorite Lamar Jackson!) or MLB. (Why Gauff was No. 1 in Sportico’s ranking but No. 3 at Forbes — trailing Świątek and Gu — comes down to the fuzzy math of estimating sponsorship income.)
Stars like Simone Biles, Alex Morgan, Megan Rapinoe and Mikaela Shiffrin also appear to be making big money.
But the practice of combining on-field and off-field earnings obscures the ongoing struggle female athletes face in terms of pay equity. Out of Gauff’s total earnings, 70% was made off of the tennis court through various brand partnerships, leaving only 30% (or $6.7 million) from her actual athletic feats, including a win at the U.S. Open in September.
Among the Top 15 women on Sportico’s list, the average member pulled in only $3.0 million in salary or prize money, versus $8.6 million from endorsements — a ratio of 26% on the field versus 74% away from it. Compare that with the Top 15 in Sportico’s list of highest-earning male athletes, who actually make more money on average from on-field exploits ($47.8 million) than endorsements ($39.7 million).
All but four of the Top 15 made more from endorsements than winnings, with some cases being particularly lopsided. Chinese-American freestyle skier Eileen Gu, for instance, earned just $27,000 on the slopes because of a knee injury suffered in January, but $20 million from endorsements. Tennis stars Emma Raducanu and Naomi Osaka — both of whom took hiatuses in 2023 – combined for $238,000 in on-court earnings but raked in $31 million in endorsements.
This isn’t meant to be a knock on Gu, Raducanu, Osaka or any other player who is able to supplement their winnings with extra income — nor do we have any interest in re-igniting the old Anna Kournikova-era debate about whether athletes should capitalize on factors beyond their playing skill.
But a version of the highest-paid female athletes list that focuses solely on money earned on the field provides an important look into the more complicated financial picture in women's sports, and how few sports are responsible for the majority of earnings.
Now, the process of compiling this data isn’t a perfect science. While prize money and earnings in the WTA, LPGA and FIS are public, and WNBA salaries are published online by HerHoopsStats, plenty of women’s leagues still keep salaries secret.
The NWSL doesn’t currently make its salary data public, nor do European Women’s Soccer leagues like the WSL, Liga F or D1 Féminine, or the many international leagues where WNBA players compete in the offseason. That said, what we do know about their salaries means it’s unlikely that players competing in any of these leagues would challenge the top names on our earnings list.
Still, the data that is available paints an interesting – and different – picture than the one that combines salary and endorsements. Here’s what that highest-paid ranking list looks like for 2023:
In terms of headlining names, there isn’t a massive difference at the top, as Polish tennis superstar Iga Świątek — who currently stands first in the world rankings — topped both our ranking and Forbes’ all-inclusive list, albeit at a number nearly 60% lower after our accounting removed endorsement pay. But it’s notable that the top spots on our list are occupied by far fewer sports. In fact, tennis and golf stars exclusively make up the Top 50, with Mikaela Shiffrin’s record-shattering $1.1 million in skiing prize money representing the most from any other sport. Shiffrin is an all-time legend — the greatest competitive skier ever by the numbers — and still in her prime, but not even a career season from her could crack the Top 60 overall.
That shouldn’t be surprising, as women’s tennis and golf pay their top players far more in prize money than the highest on-field earners from other sports:
Progress is slowly being made elsewhere. Days before 2023 ended, María Sánchez of the Houston Dash signed a record three-year, $1.5 million contract to become the NWSL’s highest-paid player, upping the previous record for annual salary (Trinity Rodman at $281,000) by a significant amount. And each member of the U.S. Women’s National Team earned $317,900 at the most recent World Cup, the result of a new CBA and pay structure that ensures equivalent prize money to what the men make.
But mainly, this exercise illustrates just how hard it still is for female athletes to make money anywhere close to on par with their male counterparts through performance in their sport alone. While men’s athletes are able to earn big both on and off the field, the richest women in sports get that way mostly from the money they make when they’re not playing, a trend that was still clearly true in 2023.
Alex Azzi contributed editing.
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