Ever turned on your television to watch Jeopardy!only to zone out wondering how much money the host Ken Jennings makes from the job? Us too. Luckily, we’ve found all there is to know about Ken Jennings’s salary, and we’re here to spread the news.
There’s been much tabloid buzz around Ken Jennings’s salary since he took over hosting the fabled game show, and we at Trivia Bliss are here to answer all your burning questions and bust some myths regarding how much he gets paid for his work at the podium.
Keep scrolling for all the juicy deets about Ken Jennings’s salary on Jeopardy! in 2023. We’ll spill the tea regarding his current salary as the new permanent host of the show, how much money he’s made in the past, and other perks of the Jeopardy! hosting job. We’ll also discuss how his salary compares to that of the G.O.A.T. Alex Trebek, as well as to that of other popular game show hosts. Let’s go!
What is Ken Jennings’s Current Salary?
So, first things first: how much money does Ken Jennings currently make as the host of Jeopardy!?
There’s some debate over how much money Ken Jennings is making as the host of Jeopardy! in 2023. When he and Mayim Bialik signed on for the job in 2021, they were each said to be making upwards of $1 million from their work on the show.
Since then, tabloids have theorized about whether or not the show’s hosts are in good standing, fabricating rumors about Mayim Bialik’s jealousy towards Ken Jennings as a more recognizable host and making both of them out to be money hungry. While these rumors are easy to write about, they’re harder to back up, so we’re going to take them as pure conjecture until more evidence emerges.
As of 2023, Ken Jennings is making just about as much money as he was when he first began hosting A.K.A. just over a million dollars. (One source listed Ken’s salary as being $4.5 million dollars per year, but we couldn’t find any other evidence to back this up. If we receive word that this figure is, in fact, the correct one, we’ll update this article.)
Side note: it’s unclear what Mayim Bialik’s salary will be for 2023 in comparison to Ken Jennings’s salary. This is because she has pulled out of hosting for the remainder of season 39 in solidarity with the Writers Guild of America strike. However, we’re getting off-topic already. Onto the next!
What Other Compensation and Perks Does Ken Jennings Get?
In addition to an ample cash sum, what else does Ken Jennings get out of his Jeopardy! hosting gig?
For one thing, the job offers flexibility. One major perk that Ken Jennings gets as host of Jeopardy! is that he does not have to be at the mercy of the show year-round. You read that right—because of his staggered hosting schedule, Ken Jennings does not have to work for Jeopardy! throughout the entire year. This is especially beneficial to him as a family man. Since he doesn’t have to host throughout the year, he surely has more time to spend with his wife, Mindy, and two children, Dylan and Caitlin.
Additionally, Jeopardy! does not shoot every day of the week. They tape their episodes two days per week, filming five episodes per day. Efficiency helps the world go ‘round and helps Ken clear his schedule for other obligations.
Another perk of the job is visibility. Sure, Ken Jennings has been a Jeopardy! legend since he first appeared on the show in 2004, but now he’s got some serious screen time. As he’s gained emceeing experience as the new host of Jeopardy!, he’s also gained new fans, and popularity can only serve the host of a television show well. Hopefully, good viewership will keep him the host of Jeopardy! for a long, long time.
In short, Ken Jennings is surely digging his hosting gig for more reasons than just the pay. Because of the position’s flexibility and fame, it’s an ideal job for a former Jeopardy! winner who wants to keep his high standing in the trivia world.
What Has He Made in the Past?
You may be wondering how much money Ken’s previous salary gave him and how it measures up to his current hosting salary. No need to Google it—we’ve got that information for you right here.
Before becoming a Jeopardy! legend, Ken Jennings was a student at the University of Washington. He transferred to Brigham Young University after completing a Mormon mission. At BYU, he double majored in computer science and English. We wouldn’t expect anything else from such a prolific trivia whiz!
After college, Ken Jennings was employed in the wonderful world of software engineering. He worked as a software engineer for CHG Healthcare Services in Holladay, Utah, staying close to his alma mater. There, he married his wife, Mindy. This is where he was working when he first got the call that he would be a contestant on Jeopardy!. The more you know!
The average salary of a software engineer in Utah is currently a little over one hundred thousand dollars—$103,315 according to Indeed, to be exact. We can assume that Ken’s salary was a little less than this due to inflation since his career.
Glassdoor estimates that this figure is significantly bigger than this. Because they estimate salaries based on each company, they’ve got the figure for Ken’s exact position at CHG Healthcare Services. Today, a software engineer at this company would earn $144,790 per year.
While that’s no salary to scoff at by any means, Ken Jennings now makes significantly more yearly than he would as a software engineer. While both jobs are demanding in different ways, we imagine that Ken appreciates the days off and the chance to appear on camera again, this time in a less pressure-filled capacity.
TL;DR, Ken Jennings made a comfortable living before first appearing on Jeopardy! and taking home a multi-million dollar bounty. However, his current salary as the host of Jeopardy! is many times that of what he made as a software engineer.
How Much Has Jennings Made as a Contestant?
Before Ken Jennings was the host of Jeopardy!, he was the show’s most legendary contestant. He lives on in the Jeopardy! Hall of Feee (rather, the Leaderboard of Legends) as the winner with the most consecutive games won: 74 games in 2004, to be specific.
While he was playing on the regular season of Jeopardy! in 2004, Ken Jennings made a whopping $2,520,700—that’s more than any other contestant in the history of the show.
And if you include his tournament winnings, his total earnings come out to be $4,370,700. Ken Jennings is only second to Brad Rutter in terms of all-time (A.K.A. including tournaments and regular season) winnings. Nice one, Ken!
Funnily enough, Ken Jennings’s hosting salary has not surpassed his earnings from his stint as a contestant—yet that is.
Ken Jennings’s salary as Jeopardy! host is set to overtake his all-time contestant earnings within the next year or so, depending on the minutiae of his earnings—since we don’t have a concrete number for his current salary that hasn’t been approximated, we don’t know this for sure. He’s likely already made enough money as a host to surpass his prior regular season winnings.
How Much Did Alex Trebek Make?
We know approximately how much money Ken Jennings makes as the current host of Jeopardy!, but how much money did beloved Jeopardy! icon Alex Trebek make during his run as host?
Alex Trebek was a television legend. He was one of the highest-paid game show hosts of all time before his death in 2020. Towards the end of his stint as Jeopardy! host, Alex Trebek made a figure upward of $10 million per year. Some sources say that this figure was closer to (but just shy of) $20 million. Either way, that’s a lot of dollars!
It makes sense that Alex Trebek would make so much more money than Ken Jennings or Mayim Bialik. Firstly, he’d been hosting for almost 40 years—he assumed his hosting duties in 1984 and didn’t stop until he passed away. Close to four decades worth of raises is sure to get you some significant cash! Surely, Alex’s salary didn’t start at $10 million. Instead, he worked his way there, just like Ken Jennings and Mayim Bialik surely will.
Additionally, Alex Trebek was such an icon in the game show world. He kept people watching Jeopardy! and his salary reflects this. Mayim Bialik and Ken Jennings are far less established hosts than Alex Trebek was by the end of his tenure, so it’s inevitable that they would make far less money than he did. No matter how much more these two progressively get paid as the years go by, it’ll be interesting to compare their salaries to Alex’s massive one.
Why is Ken Jennings Paid So Much?
So why exactly is Ken Jennings paid so much? Do his hours on the Sony soundstage really translate to millions of dollars transferred into his checking account?
According to ZipRecruiter.com, the average hourly pay for a game show host tops out at less than $25 an hour. In the same vein, Glassdoor reports that the average game show host makes between $35,000 and $45,000 yearly—chump change in comparison to Ken Jennings’s million-dollar bounty.
However, Ken Jennings has got two important things on his side: skill and celebrity. First, Ken is widely regarded as the greatest of all time when it comes to Jeopardy!. Seriously, he won the Greatest of All Time Jeopardy! tournament to prove it! He has the trivia chops to have earned his place at the host’s podium.
Because of his obvious skill, Ken Jennings has gained quite a following. His fans are happy to see him hosting the show, and they’ll continue to tune in knowing he’s the one moderating the game. These important factors make Ken Jennings a hot commodity in the quiz game show world, making him worth a higher salary than other lesser-known and less qualified hosts.
How Much Do Other Game Show Hosts Make?
You might be wondering how Ken Jennings’s salary measures up to other game show hosts’ salaries. Here’s what we know about how much money other top game show hosts are making:
Pat Sajak of Wheel of Fortune is the highest-paid game show host in the country, raking in somewhere between $12 million and $15 million per year. In 2019, he made over $312,000 per day that he filmed the show. Can you imagine earning that much money in a single day?!
In 2007, Bob Barker of The Price Is Right was also making $10 million per year from his hosting gig. Though he retired that same year, we can only imagine how much money he made during his 35-year run as the host of The Price Is Right. (Not to mention that, factoring in inflation, that $10 million salary translates to much more in today’s dollars!) In contrast, Drew Carey, the current host of The Price Is Right, makes between $9 million and $12 million (depending on your source) per year from hosting. That’s not bad for having half the seniority on the show that Bob Barker did!
Other famous game show hosts get paid per episode instead of a lump sum for the entire season. For example, when Jeff Foxworthy was hosting the hit game show Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader?, he made $150,000 for every episode he appeared on. It pays to be a good host, huh?
Steve Harvey of Family Feud fame also gets paid per episode instead of per year. He makes $20,000 for every half-hour episode that he hosts. Each season of Family Feud has at least 180 episodes, so we can assume that Steve Harvey is bringing home between $3 and $4 million for his Family Feud hosting duties.
Ever wondered how much money Vanna White of Wheel of Fortune fame makes per workday? We’re here to tell you it’s over $200,000. Plus, she only works four workdays per month! That’s right, Wheel of Fortune packs in episodes when they film to maximize their time on set. For only working 48 days of the year, we’d say that’s a pretty wildly high salary. Go, Vanna!
As you can see, Ken Jennings’s salary, though enviable for anyone, is relatively tame compared with other comparable game show hosts. It makes sense that Jeopardy! still isn’t paying him the biggest big bucks yet since he’s barely been established as host yet. Once Ken Jennings has proven himself to be a host for the ages who keeps viewers coming back, we’re confident he’ll get compensated more similarly to his peers.
Still, Jeopardy! has a reputation for being cheap. The show’s producers are known for providing only the bare minimum for their contestants, often requiring them to find their own lodging for any day beyond their first day of filming. Only time will tell whether the show will start offering more perks to its contestants and hosts.
Final Words
There you have it! You’ve made it to the end of Ken Jennings’s salary 101. We hope this article served as a good primer for anything you might want to know about the way the host of Jeopardy! is paid and gives you basic understanding of how much money game show hosts are earning these days, in general.
Was there anything that surprised you about the way Ken is paid on Jeopardy!? Or about how other game show hosts are compensated for their work? Let us know in the comments section below.
If you’ve got a hankering to know even more about the wonderful world of Jeopardy!, Trivia Bliss is the place to be. We’ve covered a vast array of Jeopardy! inner workings, like how much the show is edited, why contestants don’t get to keep all of their winnings, why there’s been debate over the show’s questions getting easier, and how the show’s contestants prepare for their time on camera. We’ve also got plenty of information on how you can host your own at-home Jeopardy! night, from the best buzzers (or even how to play without them) to sample question lists and even what food to serve. With the help of Trivia Bliss, you’re sure to have the best Jeopardy! trivia night imaginable.
And if you’re looking to bust your trivia chops, we’ve got plenty of resources to help you out, too. We boast an enormous trivia database that you can browse by category for free. We’ve also got a free random quiz question generator to help you test your general knowledge. If you prefer themed quizzes, we’ve got those to, on everything from King David to Kansas City, zany zombies to Vampire Diaries, and even Taylor Swift to Harry Styles. Whether you choose your favorite topic or pick a new one you don’t know much about, you’ll learn some new fun facts that you can whip out at your next trivia night. Stay curious, and happy quizzing!
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