Though she is only in her early 20s, Olivia Rodrigo has already reached a level of fame and net worth that few can claim to have achieved at her age. The Filipino-American singer-songwriter has earned plaudits as an actor, too, a field in which she began her career.
Rodrigo, who was born on 20 February 2003 in Murrieta, California, the US, has been recognised by the prestigious music magazine Billboard as Woman of the Year 2022. Interestingly, she was only around 2-3 years old when Reba McEntire became the first recipient of the award in 2007.
Her songs have been described as being full of youthful energy and angst. Her singing and lyrical styles have been compared to those of Taylor Swift, Alanis Morissette, Avril Lavigne and Lorde.
Rodrigo is certainly among the finest singers of the time. She has already won three Grammy Awards out of seven nods, all of which came in 2022 for her debut album, Sour.
Her nominations included the ‘Big Four’ categories at the Grammys: Album of the Year, Song of the Year, Record of the Year and Best New Artist, the last of which was one of her three wins. Only 18 years old at the time, she thus, became the second-youngest artist after Billie Eilish and the first Filipino-American to be nominated in the four categories at the same Grammy.
Among the other top honours she has received are seven Billboard Music Awards and four MTV Video Music Awards. Rodrigo has been counted among the most influential people in the world by Billboard 21 Under 21, Forbes 30 Under 30, Fortune 40 Under 40, and Bloomberg 50.
As her success on the music scene continues, Rodrigo seems clear about how to build a fortune for herself.
“You definitely have to be a businesswoman to be a musician,” she told TIME in her profile when the magazine named her the Entertainer of the Year in 2021.
Ahead of Olivia Rodrigo’s 2024 Guts World Tour stop in Singapore tomorrow, we thought it best to do a deep dive into her career, net worth, and everything else you need to know about the young star.
Olivia Rodrigo: Things to know about her career and net worth
She started as a child artist with a direct-to-video film
Olivia Rodrigo had an early start in entertainment, making her debut with the lead role of Grace Thomas in the direct-to-video film An American Girl: Grace Stirs Up Success in 2015.
At the time, Rodrigo was 12 years old. The film was about a teenager who goes on a trip to Paris, improves her baking skills, and returns to save her grandparents’ bakery by
Awinning the MasterChef Junior.
Bizaardvark gave her the first taste of fame
Rodrigo’s rise to popularity began with Disney Channel’s Bizaardvark, a comedy television show about two young musicians, who try to make it big in the world of entertainment through funny music videos on their vlog channel named Bizaardvark.
She played one of the two leads, guitarist Paige Olvera. The other lead character, keyboard player Frankie Wong, was portrayed by Madison Hu. The show was popular and Rodrigo played the character in all three seasons, from 2016 to 2019.
Stardom with High School Musical TV series
Following the end of Bizaardvark, Rodrigo landed the main role of Nini Salazar-Roberts in the Disney+ series High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. The musical drama, which revolves around the lives of students of a high school as they prepare for their musicals, propelled her to stardom.
She played the role for the first two seasons from 2019 to 2021 and appeared as a recurring character through Season 3 in 2022 before officially leaving the show with the season’s finale episode to focus on her real-life music career, which was already established by then.
Global fame as a singer with “Drivers License”
Olivia Rodrigo began her professional music career on 8 January 2021 with the release of her debut single “Drivers License”, an emotional pop ballad about teenage heartbreak.
It helped that her career as the star of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series allowed a ready set of audience. But the song was so incredible that it instantly started trending on TikTok and quickly spread like wildfire around the world.
On 23 January, Rodrigo became the youngest solo artist ever to debut at No.1 on the Billboard Hot 100. The song remained at the top spot for eight weeks.
The track also became No.1 on music streaming giant Spotify in just one week of its release. It was the most streamed song in a day on the platform with 13 million streams on 15 January, a record later broken by several artists largely due to the increase in popularity of the platform.
.@Olivia_Rodrigo‘s “drivers license” now has the record for most streams for a song in a week on Spotify https://t.co/Ke2mPGs71y
— Spotify (@Spotify) January 15, 2021
By the end of the seven days, it recorded the most streams for a song in a week on Spotify with 80 million plays. “Drivers License” ended the year 2021 as the most-streamed song on the platform with 1.1 billion streams.
Records created on the way to Sour success
Rodrigo released her second single, “Deja Vu”, on 1 April 2021. Like “Drivers License”, the second song, which, too, is about heartbreak, became an instant hit debuting at No.8 on Billboard Hot 100. This made Rodrigo the first artist in history to debut their first two releases in the top 10 of the coveted chart.
On 14 May 2021, she dropped her third single, “Good 4 U,” an upbeat song about a failed relationship. It peaked on its Billboard Hot 100 debut on 29 May and made Rodrigo the first artist to have their first three songs in the Top 10 of the chart.
“Good 4 U” also earned the title of 2021 Spotify Song of the Summer and was the fourth-most streamed song of 2021. Streamed more than 84 million times globally in the tracking week ending on 27 May, it broke the record for most plays in a week on the platform set previously by her first single.
Music superstardom with Sour
On 21 May 2021, seven days after releasing “Good 4 U,” Rodrigo dropped her debut studio album, Sour.
It was a major hit among critics. Since the album contained her first three hit singles, it became the first debut album in history to have two No.1 debut songs on the Hot 100 based on the 29 May chart.
More importantly, when “Good 4 U” took the top spot in the songs list, the album was yet to chart on Billboard 200. Billboard, therefore, noted that Sour is the first debut album by any act to generate two Hot 100 No.1s before the album’s entrance into the Billboard 200.
“Sour offered something we needed after more than a year of unending distress: an outlet for anger and permission to cry,” noted TIME.
The album peaked at No.1 on debut on Billboard 200, remaining in the position non-consecutively for five weeks.
It was also the most-streamed album globally with approximately 385 million streams on Spotify in 2021, ahead of Dua Lipa’s Future Nostalgia, Justice by Justin Bieber, = (“Equals”) by Ed Sheeran, and Planet Her by Doja Cat.
The success of Sour was followed by a YouTube concert film titled Sour Prom (2021) and a Disney+ documentary named Olivia Rodrigo: Driving Home 2 U (2022).
driving home 2 u (a SOUR film) is out march 25th on @disneyplus!!!! pic.twitter.com/5ruUVj58qo
— Olivia Rodrigo (@oliviarodrigo) February 17, 2022
Following the release of her debut album, Rodrigo took off on her first headlining tour — Sour Tour — across North America and Europe. The first show was held on 5 April 2022 in Portland, Oregon. It concluded in London, England, on 7 July after 49 shows.
Apart from winning the award for Best New Artist at the 2022 Grammy Awards, Rodrigo also won the award for Best Pop Vocal Album for Sour and Best Pop Solo Performance for “Drivers License”.
The fame continues with “Vampire” and Guts
Olivia Rodrigo released “Vampire,” the lead single of her second studio album, Guts, on 30 June 2023. It was an instant hit, peaking at No.1 Billboard Hot 100 debut on 15 July.
vampire music video bts is out now!!! https://t.co/BBW9128Pzp pic.twitter.com/a9E1HGksvb
— Olivia Rodrigo (@oliviarodrigo) July 7, 2023
She released “Bad Idea Right?” her second single from the album, on 11 August. It became the sixth song of her career to enter the Top 10 of the Hot 100 list.
On 8 September, Rodrigo dropped Guts. The album peaked on Billboard 200 on chart debut dated 23 September. The same month Rodrigo announced the Guts world tour to be held from February through August 2024.
my GUTS world tour just added 18 new dates! ticket registration is open til Sunday, 9/17 on https://t.co/BEPJxkyu21. more dates in many countries yet to come!!!! ❤️
p.s. fans who already registered can update their show preference to one of the new dates pic.twitter.com/SlRckwusDE— Olivia Rodrigo (@oliviarodrigo) September 15, 2023
Olivia Rodrigo makes her mark on the UK charts
Outside of the US, Olivia Rodrigo became the youngest solo artist in history to claim the Official UK Chart Double at age 18 years and 3 months when Sour reached No.1 on the UK’s Official Albums Chart in May 2021 and “Good 4 U” took the top position in the songs chart the same week.
She is the first female solo artist with three simultaneous UK Top 5 singles, which were attained with “Good 4 U,” “Deja Vu” and “Traitor” in June 2021.
Just like their performances in the US, “Vampire” earned Rodrigo her third No.1 on the Official singles chart in the UK while Guts took the top spot in the albums chart.
She owns the rights to her works
Olivia Rodrigo signed with Geffen Records in January 2021 to further her music career. All her music has been released by Geffen Records and produced by Dan Nigro, who is the co-songwriter of all of Rodrigo’s songs on both albums.
Clear about her future as a businesswoman in music, Rodrigo entered a partnership with Geffen Records, which allows her to own the masters of her tracks. This means that she holds the copyright to all her songs, instead of her label, which is the usual practice.
“There’s a path for me to have a stake in the music and art I create, which is only fair,” Rodrigo told TIME.
This ensures that Rodrigo will keep earning millions from her songs as she is their owner, unlike Taylor Swift, who had to re-record her old hits to be able to gain new copyright.
There was an alleged ‘fallout’ with Taylor Swift over song credits
Within her career so far, Rodrigo has also faced a bit of trouble with an alleged conflict surrounding Taylor Swift.
Rodrigo has previously spoken about being inspired by Swift. They met in person for the first time at the BRIT Awards on 11 May 2021, which was also the former’s first live performance. This was just days before Rodrigo dropped her debut album, Sour.
According to a 12 September 2023 report by Rolling Stone, it became “a little more complicated that summer, when Rodrigo gave Swift and Jack Antonoff two writing credits on Sour: first on “1 Step Forward, 3 Steps Back” (which interpolated Swift’s “New Years Day”) and then “Deja Vu” (which was inspired by Tay’s “Cruel Summer”; Rodrigo also gave a credit to St. Vincent, a co-writer on Swift’s song).”
She also gave American rock band Paramore songwriting credit on the single “Good 4 U” after its release as some fans noted similarities with the group’s track “Misery Business”.
The report says that “obsessive fans” concluded that there was a falling out between Swift and Rodrigo, even though there remains no clarity on whether Swift asked for credits.
When Rolling Stone asked her about the Swift controversy, Rodrigo said, “I don’t have beef with anyone,” she told the publication. “I’m very chill. I keep to myself. I have my four friends and my mom, and that’s really the only people I talk to, ever. There’s nothing to say.”
But she didn’t clear the air around whether she was forced to give the credits.
“It’s not something that I was super involved in. It was more team-on-team. So, I wouldn’t be the best person to ask,” she said but added that she might not “personally do that” to someone who may have done a song that sounded similar to hers.
Earlier, on 2 September 2023, Rodrigo addressed rumours that her song “Vampire” was about Swift.
“I mean, I never want to say who any of my songs are about. I’ve never done that before in my career and probably won’t. I think it’s better to not pigeonhole a song to being about this one thing. I was very surprised when people thought that,” she told The Guardian when asked about the song and its alleged connection to Swift.
Yet when she released “The Grudge,” a song from her sophomore album on 8 September, rumour mills started working overtime on whether it was about the fallout with Swift.
Nevertheless, despite the controversies involving Swift, Rodrigo has her own supporters in the top league of music stars. One of them is Katy Perry, who offered to serve as her mentor.
“The first time I met her, I put my hands on her shoulders and was like, ‘Listen, I’m here. Whatever you need.’ Because I know exactly what these pop girlies are going through, and when I was growing up, no one really did that for me,” Perry told Rolling Stone.
Casetify, Glossier and other brand endorsements
Olivia Rodrigo is still fairly new to the superstardom she has attained in music. Thus, major endorsement deals are yet to flow in. Yet it is worth noting that she did appear in a commercial for clothing retail company Old Navy before making her acting debut.
Following her stupendous success in music, Rodrigo joined hands with direct-to-consumer lifestyle brand Casetify in December 2021 for a product line creatively directed by her.
“It was really cool to be able to help create this collection with CASETiFY that reflects my vision and keeps sustainability at the forefront of each design,” Rodrigo said in a statement at the time.
The limited-edition line included a “Hardened Hearts” collection of cases for Apple iPhone models and select Samsung devices. The collection was officially launched on 15 December, priced between USD 45 and USD 75.
Her second major collaboration happened in April 2022 when the beauty brand Glossier signed her up as their first celebrity brand ambassador. As part of the deal, the brand launched Rodrigo-approved products called Olivia’s Favorites, such as the Ultralip lip colour, volume-building Boy Brow, and fine-tipped Pro Tip liquid eyeliner.
“The partnership with Olivia signifies the brand’s focus on building authentic talent partnerships grounded in real-life connections and shared values,” the company said in its announcement. “It’s also an extension of Glossier’s people-first approach to beauty with Glossier and Olivia initially connecting over the belief that beauty is above all, celebrating where you’re at today and taking pride in your beauty journey.”
Reports suggest that the brand and the Sour hitmaker have been working closely since 2021. Rodrigo wore Glossier beauty products to major events such as the Grammy Awards and American Music Awards before the official announcement of their deal.
What is Olivia Rodrigo’s net worth?
In 2024, Olivia Rodrigo’s net worth is estimated to be USD 16 million. Her rise to prominence has been rapid with just two debut albums and one headlining tour.
Some reports suggest that before she embarked on her tremendously successful music career, Rodrigo had a net worth of around USD 500,000. Of course, this included earnings from her acting career. Reports suggest that she may have earned close to half a million each from her lead roles in Bizaardvark and High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.
Things changed with her music. The success of her two albums, the chart-topping songs, Spotify records, and her tour, Rodrigo is believed to have rapidly increased her net worth to around USD 8 million. Celebrity Net Worth, which tracks the net worth of well-known personalities, says that the net worth of Olivia Rodrigo is around USD 16 million — which is double than most estimates.
There is no data about how much her Sour tour generated in revenue and her share in it. But verified data exists on the royalties she received for her music.
According to a 1 September 2021 Billboard report, “Good 4 U” had earned USD 2.4 million in global publishing royalties at that time, “accounting for streaming, sales, and some airplay activities from MRC Data, but excluding synchronization payments, radio airplay from outside the U.S, and general licensing.”
By then Rodrigo (and co-songwriter Nigro) had shared songwriting credits with Hayley Williams and Zac Farro, the co-founders of Paramore. It resulted in a 50-50 split of the earnings, meaning that Rodrigo and Nigro received USD 1.2 million. Rodrigo’s share in the song was, thus, USD 600,000 up to that point.
Billboard also estimated that Rodrigo and Nigro each received USD 598,575 from the USD 1.3 million worldwide publishing royalties for “Deja Vu” after sharing 50 per cent songwriting credit with Swift’s writing team. Swift’s personal share was USD 325,678.
Other reports suggest that she may have earned a few millions from Spotify, which reportedly pays somewhere between 0.003 cents to 0.005 cents per stream to artists. Based on this, Rodrigo would have made around USD 3 million to USD 5 million from “Drivers License” alone, which recorded over a billion streams in 2021.
However, Spotify has a complex payment system which also takes into account the artist’s popularity. This means that the estimate of her exact earnings from the platform may not be clear since she was a new artist in 2021.
(Hero and Featured images: Pandora/@pandoramusic/Twitter)
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
-What is Olivia Rodrigo’s salary?
The salary that Olivia Rodrigo received as an actor is not clear. Some reports, however, suggest that she may have earned as much as USD 1 million from her two shows.
-What are some good facts about Olivia Rodrigo?
Olivia Rodrigo holds several Billboard and Spotify records as a debut music artist, with three No.1 hits streamed millions of times and both her albums topping the Billboard 200 chart.
-Who did Olivia Rodrigo give money to?
Olivia Rodrigo had to share half of her royalties from two songs with Taylor Swift and the rock band Paramore for songwriting credits.
-How is Olivia Rodrigo so successful?
Olivia Rodrigo has gained overnight success on the music scene due to her relatable songs. Their angst-fuelled lyrics about teen heartbreak and the pressures of growing up resonate with Gen-Z. But even before her music debut, she had gained fame as a teen star with two hit shows.
The information in this article is accurate as of the date of publication.
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