It takes a sure thoughts to have the ability to compete on Jeopardy!, however solely one of the best of one of the best land on this winner’s circle. These are the highest-earning winners from the sport present — they usually’ve received thousands and thousands.
Ken Jennings is without doubt one of the most well-known excessive rollers from the ABC collection. The Washington-born creator is definitely the highest-earning American sport present contestant of all time. Along with successful $2,520,700 throughout his preliminary 74-show run on Jeopardy!, he practically doubled that quantity in quite a few particular tournaments.
In 2005’s Jeopardy! Final Match of Champions, Jennings pulled in $500,000 for second place, and in 2014, he received a $100,000 second-place prize within the Jeopardy! Battle of the A long time. He returned to the winner’s circle in 2020 when he scored the $1 million first-place prize within the Jeopardy! The Best of All Time. These are just some of his largest tournaments.
Jennings turned a Jeopardy! guide in 2020, and he began visitor internet hosting in 2021 after Alex Trebek‘s demise.
Later that 12 months, Matt Amodio entered the winners circle with a 37-game successful streak. The Ph.D. pupil from New Haven, Connecticut, is second solely to Jennings for variety of consecutive wins.
“Ken’s all the time been the face of Jeopardy! to me, so after I consider ‘Jeopardy!’ I consider him,” Amodio stated in a press launch in October 2021. “To [be] proper behind him is a surreal expertise.”
Jennings was very supportive of his newest successor. “What a run!” he tweeted after the Yale pupil’s streak ended along with his thirty eighth sport on the October 11, 2021, episode.
“Referring to #Jeopardy, ‘you’re half the person Ken Jennings is’ is a superb praise,” Amodio replied through Twitter, singing his predecessor’s praises. “Referring to life normally, it’s a good higher one. Thanks for being you, Ken [heart emoji].”
Regardless of being one in all Jeopardy!’s highest earners, Amodio revealed he doesn’t wish to cease working as a researcher. “I nonetheless haven’t any plans to spend a dime of my $1,518,601 winnings,” he wrote in an article for Newsweek days after his closing episode aired. “I’m a frugal man and I like having the chance to pack away a bit of cash ought to I would like it sooner or later or to assist out with children.”
Amodio wasn’t the one history-making winner in 2021, although. Amy Schneider shortly turned the sixth highest-earning contestant of all time on Jeopardy that December, and he or she out-earned all different feminine opponents with greater than $700,000 in winnings.
Scroll all the way down to see the highest-earning winners from Jeopardy! (together with tournaments):