In the world of gaming, Faker is a name that is synonymous with talent and A-tier skills. Hailed as ‘God’ by some, Faker aka Lee Sang-hyeok also has a massive net worth — a testament to his popularity and legendary gaming accomplishments. After all, earning the moniker of ‘The Unkillable Demon King’ was no cakewalk for him.
Lee Sang-hyeok, aka Faker, has been a professional gamer for over a decade. He took the decision as a teenager and is today widely known as the greatest player of LoL ever. His fame (and fortune) have risen steadily since he turned pro.
In his long and distinguished career, Faker has won the League of Legends World Championship five times — the first and only one to do so. In fact, it is just an extension of his earlier record of being the first to win it four times. He has won the League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK), the premier domestic LoL tournament in South Korea, a record 10 times and two Mid-Season Invitational (MSI) titles.
A player of T1 (formerly SK Telecom T1), Faker is the first inductee into the Hall of Legends, the ‘hall of fame’ equivalent created by LoL’s developer Riot Games in May 2024. Previously, he was included in Forbes’ ‘30 Under 30 – Asia – Entertainment & Sports’ list of 2019.
Such has been the impact of Faker on LoL and eSports that his rise and accomplishments are often compared to Ronaldo — the retired Brazilian legend, not Cristiano Ronaldo. In fact, a sports documentary titled Ronaldo X Faker: The Phenom was produced in 2017 by a Korean TV channel drawing parallels between the lives of the two stars from completely different sporting worlds.
Faker’s popularity can be gauged from the fact that the 2024 World Championship held at O2 Arena in London on 2 November between Faker’s team and Bilibili Gaming was watched by 6.9 million viewers at its peak, making it the most-viewed eSports match in history. Sports Illustrated noted that “Faker’s involvement” in the final was the “most vital” contributor to the viewership.
What is League of Legends?
Before we get into the Faker’s net worth and facts, a quick look at the game which made him one of the world’s greatest eSports player as well as a multimillionaire.
Developed by Riot Games, League of Legends is a team-based strategy game in which two teams of up to five players go head-to-head with an objective to destroy the other’s base.
There are more than 140 champion characters for the players to chose from the massive database of the immensely popular multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game.
LoL was originally launched in 2009. According to reports, the game has around 150-160 million active monthly players. It is free-to-play but character customisations and other in-game items are purchasable.
LoL is one of the world’s most popular games of all time. According to a 2020 report by the Olympic Games, the 2019 World Championship finals of the game in Europe were watched by 100 million unique viewers.
By comparison, the 2019 National Football League (NFL) Super Bowl was watched by 98.2 million viewers. Its celebrity fans and players include Linkin Park, which composed the official album of the 2024 World Championship, and Democratic Party leader Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, among others.
The MOBA game was part of the demonstration event for eSports at the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta and Palembang in Indonesia. Demonstration event means that medals, though awarded, are not officially counted in the tally. LoL was once again part of the eSports event which made its debut as a medal event at the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou, China. It will now be part of the 2026 Asian Games in Aichi and Nagoya, Japan. Of course, fans hope that Faker, will be a part of the South Korean team.
Who is Faker? A look at the South Korean gaming legend
What is the net worth of Faker?
There is no doubt that Lee Sang-hyeok aka Faker is a multi-millionaire by net worth. Multiple reports confirm the same. However, there is no conclusive information about exactly how much wealth Faker owns.
The only verifiable information available about the eSports legend concerns his salary, as published in the Olympic Games’ report about his career. At the time, Faker was a three-time World Championship winner — one of only two players to do so. His prize money since he turned professional in 2013 was estimated at more than USD 1 million.
Up till 2020, Faker was also earning an estimated USD 5 million per year from his prize money, endorsement deals, merchandising fees and other income. According to the profile on the Olympic Games, the figure was more than the average earnings of an English Premier League footballer.
Now, according to a 2024 report by AFP, his annual earnings are close to KRW 10 billion (around USD 7.2 million). This indicates that the net worth of Faker is growing rapidly and he could earn even more in the next couple of years as the gaming world expands.
Faker’s major brand endorsements
Faker has become incredibly famous in the world of gaming in a short period of time. His accomplishments are truly incredible and his skill as as a player is near unparalleled. According to AFP, it is said in South Korea that not everyone may know what LoL is but everyone knows Faker. This is why he is a magnet for major brands. Of course, income from endorsements, even though unclear, do add to the net worth of Faker.
Among the most well-known commercials that Faker has starred in are a series of ads for SK Telecom. Those are notable because the gamer co-starred with South Korean football icon Son Heung-min, the captain of both the national team and Tottenham Hotspur.
“It was a big honour for me,” Faker told ESPN. “Overall, I think it’s a very good experience for me to be on those various advertisements.”
Other brands endorsed by Faker include Nike, Red Bull, Samsung and fashion brand Vandy the Pink.
While most of his endorsements are as part of the T1 team, with a special focus on him, the one with American-Singaporean gaming hardware and electronics producer Razer is an individual sponsorship deal. As part of the deal, which was signed in 2021, the company has been releasing gaming hardware as exclusive Faker editions. One of the products is a Razer DeathAdder V3 Pro Faker Edition mouse customised by the South Korean gamer.
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A noteworthy name among the endorsement deals signed by Faker as part of T1 is Creative Artists Agency, an American talent and sports agency owned by French billionaire François-Henri Pinault.
“With Faker remaining dominant in his position leading T1’s flagship League of Legends team, T1 are poised to set new records and change the game, making it an optimal marketing platform for brands,” Adrian Staiti, president at CAA Sports APAC, was quoted as saying by Esports News UK when the deal was announced in 2022.
As part of T1, he was also involved in a sponsorship deal and endorsements with BMW. In April 2022, Faker shared a couple of images on Instagram showing him posing next to a BMW 4 Series car. He captioned it as “Mine”, but it is not clear if it was part of a promotion or his own car.
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The BMW deal ended in 2023, when T1 partnered with Mercedes-Benz. Reports suggest that Faker received a Mercedes-Benz EQE electric car as a part of the deal, but its exact ownership details remain unclear.
His social media following, too, add to the net worth of Faker. The gaming legend has around 1.9 million followers each on Instagram and YouTube and 3.9 million followers on Twitch. His videos on YouTube and Twitch also generate a revenue stream for the gaming great.
Important facts about Faker you should know
He has played for a single team to this date and is now its part owner
Faker’s long-running association with South Korean pro-gaming team T1 is in itself a unique feat in an industry where players can switch teams easily. He holds the record for the longest career playing for a single team in the world of professional gaming.
The team was known as SK Telecom T1 when Faker made his pro debut with it in 2013. It is operated by T1 Entertainment & Sports, which is a joint venture between South Korea’s wireless telecom major SK Telecom and American sports and entertainment company Comcast Spectacor.
While other players joined and left T1 over the years, Faker remained a constant. In fact, reports say that he did not accept offers worth millions of dollars from other teams asking him to join them. His unparalleled loyalty to T1 has earned Faker the respect of the gaming community.
According to AFP, Joe Marsh, the CEO of T1, Chinese teams have often tried to recruit Faker.
“Every time he’s a free agent the offer from China comes in and it’s USD 20 million a year to come,” Marsh had said previously.
Faker’s thoughts are different. He has said that he wants to play for South Korea.
“[T1] is a team that I’m part of,” Faker told Korea JoongAng Daily in 2020. “I’ve been with T1 for a very long time. So I think a lot of people could put me and T1 together.”
The same year he signed a new three-year deal with T1, which also made him part-owner of T1 Entertainment & Sports. This move is certainly set to increase the net worth of Faker by quite a few millions in the future.
In 2023, he signed another deal which confirmed his contract period as a gamer till 2025, at which point Faker’s age will be nearing 30. Though gamers have a much younger retirement age than in other sports, Faker has not revealed when he would hang his mouse and keyboard.
He has won an Asian Games gold medal
This is one of Faker’s most significant career achievements: He has an actual Asiad competitive gold medal to his name! He won it for South Korea at the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou. It was a historic achievement for LoL, Faker as well as South Korea as it was the first time that eSports was counted as a medal event.
The gold medal earned him an exemption from South Korea’s mandatory military service, which even BTS, one of the most successful boybands in history, could not avoid despite their historic accomplishments in the world of music.
Even when eSports made its debut at the 2018 edition of the quadrennial tournament, Faker had won a medal, a silver, for South Korea in the LoL event.
“Although it was a demonstration event, being able to wear the Taegeukgi on my chest and represent Korea did feel different,” Faker told Korea JoongAng Daily, referring to his pride of wearing the national flag of South Korea.
He set a Twitch livestream record on debut
In 2017, Faker took to livestreaming for the first time on the popular video-streaming platform Twitch. With a record 245,100 concurrent viewers, his debut stream became the most-viewed single stream ever on Twitch at the time. All he did in his debut stream was play casual games online and chat with his fans.
Within 11 months, he had amassed a Twitch following of over 1 million to become the 34th most-followed streamer on the platform by early 2018.
The same year, however, his record for most-viewed single stream was broken by American LoL streamer Tyler Steinkamp, aka Tyler1.
His ‘kill’ records are unmatched
‘Kill’ in LoL is essentially eliminating an opponent player. Faker is so deft at playing the game that he has repeatedly set and broken his own kill records in both domestic and international championships.
Three of his most incredible records were set one after the other at the 2024 World Championship in London. On 12 October, he became the first player to score 100 wins in an LoL. A few days later during the tournament, he became the first player to get his 500th kill in a world championship. He ended the tournament with the Finals MVP award, making him the first player to win it twice.
5⃣0⃣0⃣ KILLS AT WORLDS FOR @FAKER. pic.twitter.com/aIbFdcvlnI
— LoL Esports (@lolesports) November 2, 2024
Back in 2022, he had become the first player to get 500 kills in the LCK. He has since far surpassed that record.
This incredible kill record is the reason why Faker is known as the ‘Unkillable Demon King’.
Hero and Featured image credits: LoL Esports/@lolesports via X
Frequently Asked Questions
Faker's net worth is not clear. However, an AFP report suggests that he earns more than USD 7 million per year.
Faker has won numerous titles in his career. But the most significant ones are five League of Legends World Championships and 10 League of Legends Champions Korea titles.
Faker has been playing for T1 since the beginning of his professional gaming career.
Faker has won five World Championships: 2013, 2015, 2016, 2023 and 2024.
Faker is certainly one of the highest-earning eSports player of all time. However, it is not clear if he is the richest.
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Manas Sen Gupta writes at the intersection of tech, entertainment and history. His works have appeared in publications such as The Statesman, Myanmar Matters, Hindustan Times and News18/ETV. In his spare time, Manas loves studying interactive charts and topographic maps. When not doing either, he prefers reading detective fiction. Spring is his favourite season and he can happily eat a bowl of noodles any time of the day.
