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Night Light | Fortnite Fortunes

Night Light | Fortnite Fortunes

Fortnite Map Creators Are Making Serious Money

UEFN (Unreal Editor for Fortnite) creators are making bank. Last week at GDC, Epic Games announced that they’ve paid out $320M to creators in the last year. If you’re currently in the top 10 on this list, you’re killing it. This week we’re taking a look at how much creators are making on Fortnite Creative.

50 creators making $1M+, not bad.

Who is making money?

If you’re looking through this list and wondering why you don’t recognize a lot of these names, don’t worry. It’s not necessary to have a huge social media presence to make successful maps. Most of the creators doing really well right now don’t: Pandvil, PrettyBoyAm, and TheBoyDilly all have under 50K subscribers on YouTube. Also, none of them have posted a single YouTube video in the last year to their channels.

Crazy that all of the growth is happening within Creative 2.0

The reality is that many of the people on this list have been making maps for years. They’ve been finding out which game modes do well, honing their craft, and were early adopters when Creative 2.0 launched in March of last year.

What does it mean for creators?

Some of you may recognize #15 on this list, Typical Gamer. His map Super Red vs Blue has had incredible growth in the last 3 months, proving it isn’t too late to get into the mapmaking business and generate substantial income. While he does have a big social presence and promotes his map on his channels, I believe his map gained traction because of its high player retention.

TG’s map has taken off in the last 90 days.

Jimmy released an official map called MrBeast Minigames, and while it did well (he’s made about $10K from it), it’s gradually lost players, and the hype has died down. Most creators won’t create a popular map right away. It takes time to understand the Fortnite Creative landscape, and make a map that has longevity to the point where 20,000 people are playing your map 12 hours a day, 7 days a week.

How does UEFN evolve this year?

👾 More popular creators and Fortnite streamers enter the space:

It definitely helps to have a big presence to market map codes. Some will find success, and others will try it and realize it’s not for them.

💼 We’ll see the industry mature with an influx of creators entering the space and competing to propel their game into the top 20:

There are other ways to get involved in Fortnite Creative without having level design experience. Thumbnail creation, 3D modeling/asset design, and visual effects are all highly sought after skills in this emerging industry. I’d also bet that we’ll see more studios get involved with the platform.

🎨 Newer trends and game modes emerge:

When you look through the top 10 played maps each week, a lot of them are trending game modes (Red vs Blue and Boxfights). Players are deciding which game modes they want to play, and creators are constantly adding maps to meet those demands. I think this year we’ll see more experimentation, and newer trends will make their way into the top charts.

The Big Takeaway:

There is significant money to be made in Fortnite Creative 2.0. A majority of the top 50 creators have been making maps for years now. While it’s not necessary to have a large social following, we will see more Fortnite content creators enter the market and start making maps. Not everyone is going to find quick success with their first maps.