Top 10 Richest People in the World 2026 — Ranked by Net Worth

Oracle's cloud division has signed multi-billion-dollar contracts with OpenAI, xAI, and major government agencies, pushing its stock to all-time highs in early 2026. At 81, Ellison remains one of the most active tech executives in Silicon Valley, reportedly spending hours each day reviewing engineering decisions.

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates retains a net worth of around $160 billion despite decades of philanthropic giving through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Gates has donated over $60 billion to global health and education causes yet his diversified investment portfolio — managed through Cascade Investment — has kept pace, with significant positions in waste management, hospitality, and farmland across the US. His renewed focus on AI-driven healthcare diagnostics has made him a sought-after voice in global health policy. Gates has donated over 37% of his peak net worth, and his foundation has saved 10 million lives since 2000.

Google co-founder Larry Page holds an estimated net worth of ~$145 billion, primarily through his Alphabet stake and early investments in DeepMind, which Google acquired for $500 million in 2014 and is now valued at over $100 billion. Page has largely retreated from public life, residing primarily in New Zealand, but remains a major shareholder in Alphabet as it navigates the most competitive moment in internet search history against AI-native rivals. Despite having a net worth 30% larger than Jensen Huang, Page's wealth growth over the past year (12%) lags behind Huang's 55% surge.

Alphabet co-founder Sergey Brin has a net worth of approximately $140 billion, just behind his co-founder Larry Page. Brin returned to Alphabet headquarters in 2023 to work on AI projects and has been closely involved in Gemini, Google's flagship large language model. He maintains an adventurous lifestyle, having funded personal projects in airship technology and kiteboarding, while his core Alphabet holdings continue to appreciate alongside surging cloud and AI revenues.

NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang has an estimated net worth of ~$130 billion, a figure that would have been unimaginable a decade ago when NVIDIA was primarily a gaming GPU company. Huang co-founded NVIDIA in 1993 and has led it through a breathtaking transformation into the world's most critical AI infrastructure supplier, with its H100 and Blackwell chips becoming the backbone of every major AI training cluster. The NVIDIA stock price increased over 800% between 2023 and early 2026 before a modest correction, outperforming the S&P 500's 40% gain over the same period.

The "Oracle of Omaha," Warren Buffett, holds a net worth of approximately $125 billion at age 95, making him the oldest person on this list and one of the most enduring wealth creators in history. Buffett controls Berkshire Hathaway, a $1 trillion conglomerate owning GEICO, BNSF Railway, and large stakes in Apple, American Express, and Coca-Cola. In 2025, Buffett announced he would step back from day-to-day operations and hand the CEO role to Greg Abel, though he remains chairman. Unlike Bill Gates, who has given away over $60 billion, Buffett has pledged to donate 99% of his wealth, having already contributed $50 billion to the Gates Foundation and other charities.

Ballmer purchased the NBA's Los Angeles Clippers for $2 billion in 2014 — a deal widely mocked at the time but now considered one of the best sports investments ever as the franchise's value has climbed past $5 billion, representing a 150% increase. He remains one of Microsoft's largest individual shareholders.