16-Year-Old Wins $3 Million at Inaugural Fortnite World Cup

A 16-year-old Pennsylvania teen just walked away with the largest payout to a single player in the history of esports.

That’s right—this weekend’s inaugural (and massive) Fortnite World Cup competition ended in a $3 million victory for Kyle “Bugha” Giersdorf, who won by a landslide 59 points during the solo finals tournament and left the largest tennis arena in the world with much, much heavier pockets.

Bugha accrued the 59 points over six rounds of gameplay on July 28, closing out the World Cup’s third and final tournament with a lofty sum total. The tournament’s second-place finisher (silver medalist?), the 24-year-old Harrison “Psalm” Chang, followed Giersdorf with 33 points, scoring himself a neat sum of $1.8 million.

We know both players’ winnings are heartbreakingly high values, but what’s even an even more striking number is the $30 million prize pool Epic Games doled out over three tournaments: Friday’s Celebrity Pro-Am competition, Saturday’s Duos and Sunday’s Solos.

Friday’s Celebrity Pro-Am (which, if you recall, the massive Twitch streamer Ninja and electronic giant Marshmello won in 2018) resulted in $1 million wins for former League of Legends professional player Airwaks and trap producer R.L. Grime, and Saturday’s duos ended in a $3 million twin split between Cooler Esport teen player “Nyhrox” and his teammate “Aquaa.”

The 100 solo competitors and 50 two-person teams participating in the final tournaments were the cream of the Fortnite crop—each slate of competitors was culled from the 40 million players competing in 10 weeks’ worth of regional qualifying competitions.

Sure, Giersdorf’s earnings amount to a lot of money, but—humbly enough—the player followed his win by telling the BBC he wanted to save most of his prize money: “All I want is a new desk and maybe a desk for my trophy.”

You can check out a full list of the Solo final standings and earnings here.