Forbes World’s Billionaires List

The Richest in 2022

EDITED BY KERRY A. DOLANAND CHASE PETERSON-WITHORNPRESENTED BYWar, pandemic and sluggish markets hit the world’s billionaires this year. There are 2,668 of them on Forbes’ 36th-annual ranking of the planet’s richest people—87 fewer than a year ago. They’re worth a collective $12.7 trillion—$400 billion less than in 2021. The most dramatic drops have occurred in Russia, where there are 34 fewer billionaires than last year following Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, and China, where a government crackdown on tech companies has led to 87 fewer Chinese billionaires on the list.
Still, Forbes found more than 1,000 billionaires who are richer than they were a year ago. And 236 newcomers have become billionaires over the past year—including the first ever from Barbados, Bulgaria, Estonia and Uruguay. America still leads the world, with 735 billionaires worth a collective $4.7 trillion, including Elon Musk, who tops the World’s Billionaires list for the first time. China (including Macau and Hong Kong) remains number two, with 607 billionaires worth a collective $2.3 trillion. We used stock prices and exchange rates from March 11, 2022 to calculate net worths. See below for the full list of the world’s billionaires and our methodology. For daily updated net worths of all 2,668 billionaires, check out our real-time billionaires rankings.

JAMEL TOPPIN FOR FORBES, GETTY TAYLOR HILL/GETTY IMAGES, DEAN MACKENZIE FOR FORBES, BILL PUGLIANO/GETTY IMAGES, CHRIS JACKSON/GETTY IMAGESMIXED BAG
The number of billionaires worldwide fell, but 40% of those who remained got richer.

Methodology

The Forbes World’s Billionaires list is a snapshot of wealth using stock prices and exchange rates from March 11, 2022. Some people become richer or poorer within days of publication. We list individuals rather than multigenerational families who share fortunes, though we include wealth belonging to a billionaire’s spouse and children if that person is the founder of the fortune. In some cases we list siblings or couples together if the ownership breakdown among them isn’t clear, but here an estimated net worth of $1 billion per person is needed to make the cut. We value a variety of assets, including private companies, real estate, art and more. We don’t pretend to know each billionaire’s private balance sheet (though some provide it). When documentation isn’t supplied or available, we discount fortunes. For daily updates of net worths, go to www.forbes.com/real-time-billionaires.

Acknowledgements

Special thanks to CBRE, FactSet Research Systems, LCH Investments, Orbis by Bureau Van Dijk, PitchBook Data, Real Capital Analytics, S&P Capital IQ, VesselsValue and the other experts who helped us with our reporting and valuations, including George de Benedicty, Ocala Ranches; Ben Bienvenu, Stephens; Jurgen Brauer, Small Arms Analytics; Sebastian Bray, Berenberg; Jonathan Chappell, Evercore ISI; Rommel T. Dionisio, Aegis Capital Corp.; Truman Fleming; Randy Giveans, Jefferies; Seth Goldstein, Morningstar; Lars Haugen, CBRE; Ashley Helgans, Jefferies; Evelyn Hendrich, Hendrich Real Estate; Arpine Kocharyan, UBS; Jonathan Lamers, BMO Nesbitt Burns; Gail Lissner; Irene Luke, Savills Monaco; Jack McCabe; Alison McGavigan, JLL; Ross Moore, Cresa; Bruce Nash, Nash Information Services; Joel Paige; Alok Patel, Berenberg; Carrie Russell, HVS; James Rutherford, Stephens; Brian Sudano, Beverage Marketing Corporation; Tim Swannie, Home Hunts; Douglas B. Taylor; Andrea Teixeira, J.P. Morgan; Steph Wissink, Jefferies; Jeffrey Wlodarczak, Pivotal Research Group; Anastasia Yianni, Cyprus Sotheby’s International Realty; Ian Zaffino, Oppenheimer & Co.

Credits

EDITOR: Kerry A. Dolan
DEPUTY EDITOR: Chase Peterson-Withorn
ASIA EDITOR: Naazneen Karmali
COUNTRY EDITORS: Russell Flannery, Jane Ho, Luisa Kroll, Natalie Robehmed
WEALTH TEAM: Richard J. Chang, David Dawkins, Matt Durot, Eliza Haverstock, Cole Horton, John Hyatt, Belle Long, Jemima McEvoy, Andrea Murphy, James O’Donnell, Rachel Sandler, Giacomo Tognini, Gigi Zamora and reporters at Forbes-licensed editions in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Israel, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia and Ukraine, and Affärsvärlden of Sweden.
REPORTERS: Dan Alexander, Anderson Antunes, Angel Au-Yeung, Megha Bahree, Nina Bambysheva, Karina Barrymore, Margherita Beale, Justin Birnbaum, Tim Boreham, Igor Bosilkovski, Thomas Brewster, Jonathan Burgos, Kenrick Cai, Nilgun Cavdar, Shu-Ching Jean Chen, Isabel Contreras, Lauren Debter, Michael del Castillo, Steven Ehrlich, Amy Feldman, Gloria Haraito, Chris Helman, Alvaro Hernandez Zorrilla, Katie Jennings, John Kang, Jeff Kauflin, Alex Knapp, Alex Konrad, Eunice Lam, Zinnia Lee, Pudji Lestari, Nicole Lindsay, Katherine Love, Iain Martin, Anis Shakirah Mohd Muslimin, Lan Anh Nguyen, Robert Olsen, Phisanu Phromchanya, Jonathan Ponciano, Aayushi Pratap, Marella Putri, Anu Raghunathan, Yessar Rosendar, Leonard Schoenberger, James Simms, Chloe Sorvino, Deborah Steinborn, Jessica Tan, Michela Tindera, Hank Tucker, Ozer Turan, Simran Vaswani, Lisette Voytko, Catherine Wang, Yue Wang, Ardian Wibisono, Rachel Williamson, Candice Wong, Will Yakowicz, January Yen, Itai Zehorai.
RESEARCH: Sue Radlauer
EDITORIAL OPERATIONS: Justin Conklin
DESIGN DIRECTOR: Alicia Hallett-Chan
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY: Robyn Selman
PHOTO RESEARCH: Merrilee Barton, Gail Toivanen
DESIGN: Fernando Capeto, Stephanie Jones, James Kim, Nick Sheeran, Philip Smith
VIDEO PRODUCERS: Meg Christensen, Matt Kang, Juliet Muir, Jon Palmer, Kirsten Taggart
VIDEO DIRECTORS: Greg Andersson, Ivan Clow, Riley Hallaway, Bernard Osei, Morgan Sun
PRODUCT: Autumn Jones
ENGINEERING: Gustavo Faria, Mays Shatnawi, Dmitri Slavinsky
QA: Waed Mousa, Ronak Ray