Contents
- Creator economy employment statistics: U.S. digital-creator FTE jobs
- Creator economy employment statistics: Brazil’s Hotmart-linked direct and indirect work
- Creator economy employment statistics: Brazilian creator work and income-source patterns
- Creator economy employment statistics: U.K. creative-industry self-employment
- Creator economy employment statistics: work availability in the U.K. screen sector
- Sources
Creator economy employment statistics: U.S. digital-creator FTE jobs
The International Advertising Bureau (IAB) estimated 1,500,000 U.S. full-time-equivalent (FTE) jobs for digital creators in its 2025 report. FTE expresses work as the equivalent number of full-time earners; it is not a headcount of everyone who creates online content. IAB’s methodology describes adjusting a professional-creator estimate to its equivalent number of full-time earners. IAB, Measuring the Digital Economy, Table 6.9 and p. 112
The same table estimates 9,208 FTE jobs at creator tools and services firms. Its combined total for digital creators and those firms is 1,509,208 FTE jobs.
| U.S. creator-economy category | Estimated FTE jobs |
|---|---|
| Digital creators | 1,500,000 |
| Creator tools and services firms | 9,208 |
| Total | 1,509,208 |
These are estimates presented in the 2025 report, not a count of people on payroll at a single point in time. IAB notes that it uses the most recent publicly available information and that some underlying data may predate 2024. IAB, Table 6.9 and table note
The report places its estimate in the context of IAB’s earlier approach. In its 2020 study, IAB described the economic impact of U.S. online content creators as equivalent to about 200,000 people earning the then national average wage, printed as $55,000 per annum. This was a wage-equivalent measure, not a headcount of all creators. The 2025 report presents its estimate as 7.5 times the estimate in that 2020 study. IAB, pp. 25 and 111
Creator economy employment statistics: Brazil’s Hotmart-linked direct and indirect work
A 2024 release from FGV Comunicação Rio reported 389,000 direct and indirect jobs created in Brazil’s digital-products sector over the 12 months covered by the study’s second edition. The release also described the figure as “more than 389 thousand.” It concerns work connected with a digital-products sector, rather than a count of creators alone. FGV Comunicação Rio, 22 November 2024
The release says the first edition had reported over 302,000 jobs. It separately reports 30% growth in direct and indirect jobs generated by Brazil’s Creator Economy over the 12 months before the 2024 report. The first-edition figure and the growth rate are distinct claims; neither should be treated as an additional exact annual count. FGV Comunicação Rio, opening paragraph and release headline
The study combines different types of evidence. FGV says it conducted telephone interviews from 26 August to 4 September 2024 with 612 content creators who sell digital products on Hotmart, alongside internal company data and market projections. The employment figures describe direct and indirect work in the digital-products sector; the interviews describe a specific group of sellers. FGV Comunicação Rio, methodology paragraph
Creator economy employment statistics: Brazilian creator work and income-source patterns
FGV’s survey offers a profile of the 612 interviewed creators who sell digital products on Hotmart. In the 2024 survey, 42% of respondents said selling digital products was their primary source of income. This is an income-source measure among survey participants, not an estimate of how many people work in the sector. FGV Comunicação Rio, survey findings and methodology
Among surveyed creators who identified Hotmart as their primary income source, 64% reported a significant increase in earnings over the prior year. That response refers to this subgroup and describes reported earnings experience, not a measured change in the number of jobs. FGV Comunicação Rio, survey findings
The release reports 3 respondent-profile and work-practice indicators:
- Age: 61% of surveyed creators were under 40 years old.
- Education: 59% had a university degree, while 16% held postgraduate, master’s, or doctoral qualifications.
- Use of AI tools: 55% of creators and co-creators said they used AI tools for some task or aspect of content creation.
The age and education figures describe survey respondents. The AI figure concerns a work practice among creators and co-creators; it does not measure employment or establish how AI affects jobs. These findings should be read within the survey’s stated population of Hotmart digital-product sellers, rather than generalized to every creator in Brazil. FGV Comunicação Rio, survey findings and methodology
Creator economy employment statistics: U.K. creative-industry self-employment
The U.K. House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee cited Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) estimates classifying 675,000 filled creative-industries jobs as self-employed during calendar year 2022, out of almost 2.4 million total jobs. These are filled jobs in the wider creative industries, not creator-only employment. House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee, para. 41
The Committee said the creative-industries self-employment rate had remained around 32% over the ten years preceding its 2024 report, varying between 28% and 35%. For comparison, it cited a 16% self-employment rate for the U.K. economy as a whole. The sector rate describes a broader creative-industry workforce; it should not be read as the rate among digital creators. House of Commons Committee, para. 41
The report also gives a separate cultural-sector measure for 2022: approximately 47% of the U.K.-wide cultural-sector workforce worked freelance, equivalent to 327,000 jobs out of 694,000. The Committee notes that the cultural sector overlaps with, but is distinct from, the creative industries. These figures therefore have a different stated population from the DCMS creative-industries estimate. House of Commons Committee, para. 41
Creator economy employment statistics: work availability in the U.K. screen sector
A February 2024 Bectu report found that 68% of film and television workers in the freelancer-reliant screen sector were not currently working, mainly due to industry slowdowns. The Committee said this was only marginally better than the September 2023 figure, when 74% of the cited workers were not working. These are dated measures of work status in the screen sector, not creator-specific unemployment rates. House of Commons Committee, para. 44
The Committee also relayed a finding from a 2023 Creative Access survey: disabled individuals were reported as 30% more likely to be freelancing after a negative experience in a permanent role. This is a relative-likelihood comparison, not a 30-percentage-point difference, and the report’s wording ties it to that experience and survey context. House of Commons Committee, para. 45
Earlier evidence on freelance conditions comes from 2016 research based on IPSE surveys of freelancers working in the creative industries. The average freelancer spent 15.5 days a year working for free and lost almost £5,400 to this unpaid work, according to the Committee’s account. The measure concerns creative-industry freelancers and retains the period and units reported; it is not a current-year estimate. House of Commons Committee, para. 46
The same 2016 IPSE survey found that 54% of respondents said they had worked for free in the hope of gaining exposure, while 45% said they had worked for free to be associated with a reputable brand. These are reported reasons among survey respondents; they do not show how common unpaid work is across all workers or sectors today. House of Commons Committee, para. 48
Taken together, the U.K. evidence covers creative-industry self-employment, cultural-sector freelance jobs, screen-sector work availability, and survey responses about unpaid work. It supplies context on work arrangements and conditions around creative careers, but does not provide one creator-only employment series. House of Commons Committee, paras. 41, 44–46 and 48
Sources
- Measuring the Digital Economy: Advertising, Content, Commerce, and Innovation (IAB, 2025)
- Creator Economy sees 30% growth in direct and indirect job creation in Brazil, according to a study by FGV Comunicação Rio
- Creator remuneration: Fifth Report of Session 2023–24 (House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee)