Jay Shetty has officially entered the big leagues of podcasting money. The 38-year-old host of On Purpose features prominently on Forbes‘ Highest-Paid Podcasters 2026 list, with the outlet detailing how the former monk turned self-help entrepreneur has built what he calls a “conscious empire” around wellness, media and business.
According to Forbes, Shetty earned an estimated $21 million over the past 12 months from his previous distribution and ad-sales agreement with iHeartMedia. When that deal expired this year, four major media companies reportedly competed for his show, and Shetty ultimately signed with Spotify and Netflix in a combined deal worth an estimated $100 million over three years — one of the biggest podcasting contracts since Spotify’s landmark deal with Joe Rogan in 2020, as per Forbes’ earlier reporting.
From a monk’s cell to a Hollywood Hills studio
Shetty left monastic life in 2013 and began posting short motivational videos on social media a few years later. He launched On Purpose in 2019 as what he described to Forbes as a shoestring operation, recording out of his own bedroom with rented cameras. The show’s early break, per the outlet, came when it landed Kobe Bryant as a guest that year — one of the NBA legend’s last long-form interviews before his death.
His 2020 book, Think Like a Monk, hit No. 1 on the New York Times bestseller list and has sold more than two million copies worldwide, according to Forbes, cementing an international fanbase that has become central to his podcast’s appeal.
Ahead of On Purpose’s relaunch on Netflix this month, Shetty told Forbes he spent roughly $500,000 renovating his recording studio, with specific colours and custom artwork intended to evoke vulnerability from his guests. The studio sits inside his sprawling Hollywood Hills home, estimated to be worth $8 million — a striking contrast, Forbes notes, to the humble detachment Shetty once practiced and preached as a monk.
Reflecting on that distance, he said: “I mean, I’m not a monk anymore. Today I consider myself an entrepreneur and a leader in this space…that allows me to have the ability to use money as a resource to do good in the world.”
Building beyond the podcast
Shetty’s earnings are being funnelled into an expanding portfolio, Forbes reported. He has invested in Austin-based blood-testing company Function Health, founded a sparkling tea brand called Juni, and runs a production company, Perfect Strangers, which produces the hit podcast Friends Keep Secrets alongside a handful of TV projects in development at Netflix, including a forthcoming dating show.
Explaining the philosophy behind the expansion, Shetty told Forbes:
“The whole point of having a partnership like this is to improve what we’re creating… It’s really exciting — and really scary.”
Netflix’s chief content officer, Bela Bajaria, told the outlet that the streamer’s TV development deals with Shetty were negotiated separately from the podcast agreement, adding: “I want to be in business with the most talented people in the world, period. And he’s one of them.”
Self-help’s lucrative — and scrutinised — economy
Shetty is part of a wider boom in self-help podcasting, a category Forbes notes has become especially profitable, with motivational speaker Mel Robbins and neuroscientist Andrew Huberman estimated to have earned $35 million and $18 million respectively from their shows over the past year. Health-focused brands such as AG1 and BetterHelp pay heavily to advertise on these shows, and Shetty’s own partners include meditation app Calm and supplement makers BIOptimizers and IM8.
Jordan Newman, Spotify’s head of content partnerships, told Forbes that advertisers view shows like Shetty’s as “a really fruitful place” to spend their marketing budgets.
The genre hasn’t been free of controversy, however. Forbes pointed to past investigative reporting — including a 2024 feature in The Guardian — that raised accusations of plagiarism against Shetty, along with questions about his account of his years as a monk and the credentials behind his $7,000 certification courses. Shetty has denied any wrongdoing, according to Forbes.
What’s next for the “conscious empire”
Despite the scrutiny, Shetty’s commercial standing appears undiminished. He is reportedly keeping his company lean, with just 18 employees, and focusing on a small number of projects at a time — a strategy he hopes will help him avoid the fate of other celebrity production houses that have scaled back in recent years.
Looking ahead, Shetty told Forbes he intends to keep going for decades: “I want to do this for as long as Fallon and Letterman and Oprah and Ellen did their shows — and even longer… I hope I do this until I’m 70.”