“Not good at breaking even”: Beast Games losses won’t phase MrBeast from future seasons

YouTuber and creator of Beast Games MrBeast has admitted that season one of the Amazon show will see him lose money, but his vision for the project remains clear and he'd do it all again in a heartbeat.

Season one of Beast Games arrived to Prime Video in mid-December with the show wrapping up in the coming weeks. And, even though the budget ballooned beyond $100 million — most of it invested by MrBeast himself — he says it was never about the money.

"In terms of money, [Beast Games] won't be ROI positive for me," MrBeast said during a Jan. 29 podcast with Colin and Samir, during which he was asked at length about Beast Games and how his channel has evolved.

MrBeast affirmed that money wasn't a major concern to him as a return on investment hasn't ever been the biggest priority of his. "At its core, do people watch the show and enjoy it? Do people get connected to the contestants, do they feel like they know them?" he said.

"This is more the success on my side. The wave I've been on the last 18 months is making people feel things and telling stories and less around retention [or] data analytics. Whatever they pay me for season two or three I'm just going to reinvest.

MrBeast wasn't willing to say whether future seasons of the show had been greenlit. In fact, he was dissuaded from saying so: "I probably shouldn't. The thing is I love what we did with Beast Games and I loved working with Prime Video. There's no world where I'm not [continuing with the Beast Games concept]."

MrBeast went on to say any returns — monetary or otherwise — weren't ever expected for the show's first season. "If people feel stuff and know they can watch this and it's going to give them emotions, that to me is a win. Obviously I want Beast Games to be the biggest competition reality show to ever exist... I don't think that's going to happen with season one."

Of importance to MrBeast has been a focus on developing storylines and characters throughout the show's first season — something he feels other reality shows haven't got right.

"There are great moments in competition reality shows but a lot of times it's then followed by a lot of boring stuff. This isn't that, so I think people are gonna love the way they feel and if they watch deep enough, they're gonna love the way they get to know the contestants like nothing else."

"My biggest fear would be that people think episode one or two are is how all ten will be," he said, worrying whether viewers will connect with those that remain in the competition as the season rolls on. "Obviously some people aren't gonna like it."

MrBeast linked up with Amazon in March to create the Beast Games, a reality competition show based heavily on Netflix's Squid Game with millions of dollars in prizes and on a scale never seen before in the genre. Over 2,000 contestants battled for 1,000 spots in the show, with the 10-episode season now well underway.

Over 50 million people have tuned in to watch season one of Beast Games. Amazon reported the show was the second-fastest to the number in 2024 behind "Fallout" and was incredibly popular outside of the U.S.

But it hasn't been the smoothest ride for MrBeast or Beast Games. In October it was revealed that, among several other records, MrBeast had spent over $100 million on developing the show with Amazon. It's not clear whether this price tag includes future seasons of the show.

This, plus reports of "terrible" conditions on the set of the qualifier and a class action lawsuit demanding damages be paid, cast a shadow over the show's launch.

Reviews for the early episodes of Beast Games were quite mixed; while many remarked at the scale and spectacle, others called it "YouTube on steroids" with The Guardian stating Beast Games is "one of the most undignified spectacles ever shown on TV."

Beast Games is on Amazon Prime Video. Episode eight goes live today, with the series wrapping up Feb. 10.

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