Dana White, best known as president and CEO of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), recently joined the board of tech company Meta; a business move that will make him even richer.
“I’ve never been interested in joining a board of directors until I got the offer to join Meta’s board,” White said in a statement. “I am a huge believer that social media and AI are the future. I am very excited to join this incredible team and to learn more about this business from the inside. There is nothing I love more than building brands, and I look forward to helping take Meta to the next level.”
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White is credited with saving the UFC from going out of business in the early 2000s and helping the sport break into mainstream media. Since then, his net worth has exploded into the millions, along with the many fighters he’s signed.
Here’s a look at how White got rich and exactly what his net worth is today.
How did Dana White get his start?
White was born on July 28, 1969, in Manchester, Connecticut, and loved fighting sports from an early age. He watched his first boxing match – featuring the legendary Muhammad Ali – at just 5 years old.
During his childhood, White moved from New England, to Las Vegas, back to the Northeast in Maine, and finally settled in Boston for a stretch. After high school he worked for an asphalt paving company and then for a hotel as a bellman.
“I’m standing in the lobby one day, and just thinking, ‘What the hell am I doing here?’…I make cash every day, plus get a check at the end of the week, got great benefits…but I’m not happy here,” White told Forbes in a 2014 interview. “So I literally walked out the front door, told my buddy I was quitting. Of course he told me I was nuts and [asked me], ‘What are you going to do?’ And I said, ‘I’m gonna get into the fight business.’ And that’s it…That’s what I did.”
For the next 10 years, he boxed, trained boxers, ran gyms and stuck to his dream of hashing it out in the fight business. Eventually he moved back to Vegas and got involved in mixed martial arts (MMA), where he became familiar with the UFC: a promotional company that organized MMA fights.
Along with a few friends, White formed Zuffa LLC and bought the struggling UFC in 2001; eventually turning it into a multibillion-dollar company.
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What is Dana White’s net worth in 2025?
Dana White has an estimated net worth of $500 million, according to Celebrity Net Worth. Much of his net worth came from selling his stake in the UFC in 2016, although he still works as the company’s CEO.
How much did Dana White pay for the UFC?
White bought the UFC in 2001, when it was on the brink of bankruptcy.
“I ended up finding that out, that they’re in trouble, and they’re probably going to go out of business,” he said in his interview with Forbes. “And I’d been to a [UFC] event, and I was looking around and thinking, ‘Imagine if they did this, and imagine if they did that. This thing could actually be really big.'”
Together with brothers Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta – who were and remain wealthy Vegas casino magnates – White created Zuffa LLC and purchased the UFC for $2 million.
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How much did Dana White sell the UFC for?
In 2016, the Fertitta brothers sold the UFC – and White sold his 9% share – for just under $4 billion. Per Celebrity Net Worth, his cut from the sale, after taxes, was around $360 million.
What is Dana White’s salary?
Though White no longer owns the UFC, he continues to run it from the position of CEO. And it’s a very lucrative endeavor. He reportedly makes around $20 million per year, a large share of which comes from UFC income such as events, sponsorships and more.
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What does Dana White spend his money on?
White spends his money like many other wealthy businessmen: on things like yacht trips, gambling and mansions.
Sports Illustratedreported that White took the famous “AHPO” yacht on vacation in July 2024. The 377-foot mega-yacht houses a luxurious gym, movie theater, salon, spa and more, and costs $2.8 million per week.
White is also a regular gambler whose wallet has taken big hits over the years. In a 2024 appearance on the Lex Fridman podcast, he revealed he once lost $3 million while gambling drunk in Rio. “This was a huge learning lesson for me,” he said, “so I never drank again when I was playing cards after that night.”
But he’s not always irresponsible with his millions. In fact, White’s nine-bedroom, 14-bathroom Las Vegas mansion – valued around $50 million – was a very good investment on his part. He purchased the home in 2006 for just $1.65 million.
