Alex Cooper Net Worth: From a $70,000 Barstool Salary to a $125 Million Empire

Alex Cooper Net Worth at a Glance

From Newtown to Barstool: How It Started

Alexandra Cooper was born on August 21, 1994, in Newtown, Pennsylvania. Her father, Bryan Cooper, was a television producer for the Philadelphia Flyers NHL team; her mother, Laurie Cooper, is a psychologist. Growing up in a household where storytelling, sports media, and psychology all coexisted gave Cooper an early instinct for the combination that would later define her show. She attended Boston University on a Division I soccer scholarship — an athletic background that shaped both her competitive temperament and her comfort performing under pressure.

After graduation, she moved to New York City and worked in advertising sales — a job that gave her direct training in how brands spend money, what audiences they target, and how to pitch a product to a buyer. That commercial education turned out to be more useful than she could have anticipated. In 2018, she and her roommate Sofia Franklyn created Call Her Daddy, an unfiltered comedy and advice podcast about dating, sex, and relationships. Within one month of the first episode, Barstool Sports acquired the show. Within two months, downloads had grown from 12,000 to 2 million.

The Negotiation That Built the Fortune

This is the central financial event of Alex Cooper’s career. It is worth understanding in detail because it explains the trajectory of everything that followed.

When Barstool Sports first brought Cooper and Franklyn on, the reported offer was approximately $70,000 base salary — a figure that, given the show’s rapid growth, quickly became inadequate. As Call Her Daddy became one of Barstool’s most valuable properties, Cooper successfully renegotiated. Barstool founder Dave Portnoy offered her $500,000 per year to stay. She declined.

From a $70,000 offer to a $60 million Spotify deal in three years. The gap between those two numbers is the story of what happens when a creator understands the value of what they own.

In spring 2020, a public dispute erupted between Cooper, Franklyn, and Portnoy over contract terms and ownership. Franklyn departed. Cooper negotiated directly with Barstool, reached an agreement to complete her existing contract, and then used the remainder of that contract period to position for the independent move. In June 2021, she signed a $60 million, three-year exclusive deal with Spotify — at the time the second-largest podcast deal ever signed, behind only Joe Rogan’s Spotify contract. Spotify’s highest-earning female podcaster. $20 million per year. From a $70,000 salary to a nine-figure deal in three years.

The Spotify Era: $60 Million and a Show Transformation

The Spotify deal did more than pay Cooper well. It gave her the resources and platform to transform Call Her Daddy from an explicit dating-and-sex show into a mainstream cultural event. The format evolved toward celebrity interviews, mental health conversations, and cultural commentary — without entirely abandoning the unfiltered candour that built the original audience. The guest list reflected the new scale: Miley Cyrus, Kim Kardashian, Hailey Bieber, Post Malone, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jane Fonda, John Mayer, Michelle Obama, and Kamala Harris, who appeared in October 2024 ahead of the presidential election.

From 2021 through 2024, Call Her Daddy ranked as the second most popular podcast globally on Spotify, behind only Joe Rogan’s The Joe Rogan Experience — four consecutive years at number two on the platform with the largest podcast audience in the world. In January 2025, the show received Spotify’s Silver Creator Milestone Award after surpassing 250 million streams on the platform. Average audience per episode reached approximately 10 million listeners. By any podcast industry metric, the show was operating at the top of a very short list.

The SiriusXM Upgrade: $125 Million

When the Spotify deal concluded in 2024, Cooper did not renew at the same terms. She upgraded. In August 2024, she signed a three-year-plus deal with SiriusXM worth up to $125 million — covering Call Her Daddy and the full Unwell Network lineup. SiriusXM received exclusive advertising and distribution rights for her flagship podcast and her Unwell brand’s shows. The show remains available to stream on all platforms including Spotify, but SiriusXM controls the advertising revenue and distribution infrastructure.

The deal effectively doubled her annual earnings. At approximately $40 million per year under the SiriusXM contract, Cooper now earns more annually than most traditional television network anchors, film directors, and established musicians. In June 2025, Forbes ranked her seventh on its Top-Earning Creators list, estimating her 2024 earnings at $32 million. The Forbes figure represents confirmed and estimated income for that single calendar year — the SiriusXM deal’s full annual value was not yet reflected, suggesting her 2025 and 2026 earnings are likely higher.

The Unwell Network and Trending Media Company

Cooper did not stop at one podcast. In September 2023, she launched the Unwell Network — a podcast collective built to sign and develop the next generation of female-led creators, partnering with Spotify’s enterprise platform Megaphone for hosting and distribution. Initial signings included Alix Earle (Hot Mess with Alix Earle, which debuted at number one on podcast charts), Madeline Argy (Pretty Lonesome with Madeline Argy, which reached the top five within its launch week), Harry Jowsey (Boyfriend Material), and Owen Thiele (In Your Dreams).

The Unwell Network operates alongside Trending, a broader media company Cooper co-founded with her husband and business partner Matt Kaplan — a film producer and founder of Ace Entertainment — with a stated aim to “elevate the voices and stories of Gen Z.” The SiriusXM deal covers the full Unwell Network lineup, not just Cooper’s flagship show, which means her company’s commercial value is embedded in the deal structure rather than running separately from it.

In February 2025, Alix Earle departed the Unwell Network — the first significant talent loss for the platform. The departure was widely covered in media and podcasting industry publications. Its financial impact on the Unwell Network’s valuation is not publicly documented, though Earle had been the network’s most prominent non-Cooper talent.

Beyond Podcasting: Olympics, Film, and Consumer Products

Cooper’s commercial activity in 2024 and 2025 extended well beyond podcasting. She served as a commentator and host during NBC’s coverage of the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris — a national broadcast assignment that placed her alongside legacy sports media figures and significantly expanded her visibility beyond the podcast audience. She launched Unwell Hydration, a consumer beverage product that extends the Unwell brand into physical retail. In June 2025, a two-part documentary series titled Call Her Alex premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and began streaming on Hulu on June 10 — the first significant documentary treatment of her career. She also made her acting debut in 2026, appearing as herself in the film adaptation of Verity, interviewing Anne Hathaway’s character on her podcast.

In 2025, Cooper was named to Time magazine’s inaugural TIME100 Creators list in the “Titans” category — a designation that places her alongside figures whose platforms have generated cultural and commercial impact at a scale beyond individual entertainment careers.

Why the $60 Million Net Worth Estimate Has Context

The most commonly cited net worth figure for Alex Cooper is $60 million. Forbes’ 2024 single-year earnings estimate of $32 million makes this figure appear conservative — if she earned $32 million in one year, why is her accumulated net worth only $60 million after several years of comparable or higher income?

The answer is the same structural reality that applies to every high-income individual: taxes, business costs, and reinvestment. Federal and state income taxes at her earnings level can consume 40–50% of gross income. The Unwell Network and Trending media company require significant ongoing investment — talent fees, production infrastructure, staff, legal costs, and development expenses. Brand partnerships, live event production, and consumer product launches all carry operational costs that reduce net profit below gross revenue.

The $60 million figure is most accurately understood as personal liquid and asset wealth — what remains after the above — rather than a lifetime earnings total, which would be substantially larger. With the SiriusXM deal running through at least 2027 at approximately $40 million per year, and Trending expanding its footprint, her net worth is almost certainly growing faster than the estimate reflects.

What Alex Cooper’s Financial Story Tells Us

Call Her Daddy started in an apartment. Six years later it is the structural foundation of a media company with two nine-figure platform deals, a creator network, a consumer products line, a documentary, and a film credit. The speed of that trajectory is partly a function of the moment — podcast advertising economics created opportunities in 2021 that did not exist before — but it is primarily a function of negotiation. Cooper’s willingness to walk away from $500,000 per year at Barstool and compete directly against the largest platforms in audio is the single decision that made everything else possible.

The $60 million net worth is a consequence of that decision. So is the $32 million in annual earnings. And so is the fact that at 31, with the SiriusXM contract running until at least 2027, the financial story is still very much in progress.

All net worth figures are estimates based on publicly reported sources. Alex Cooper has not publicly confirmed a specific net worth.