Ukrainian esports players have won major tournaments many times, including The International in Dota 2 and majors in Counter-Strike. Thanks to these successes, many of them have become dollar millionaires — they have secured a comfortable life for many years to come, although they were just sitting at their school desk yesterday.
Ukrainian esports players have won major tournaments many times, including The International in Dota 2 and majors in Counter-Strike. Thanks to these successes, many of them have become dollar millionaires — they have secured a comfortable life for many years to come, although they were just sitting at their school desk yesterday.
«Among the young esports players currently playing in Ukrainian clubs, we can mention Artem „Yuragi“ Golubev from Natus Vincere in Dota 2. During his career, he earned over $470,000. He earned most of this money playing for the European team OG, with which he won the ESL One Stockholm Major 2022 and even participated in The International 2022. His current teammate Oleg „kaori“ Medvedok also took third place in the ranking — he has so far earned a little over $190,000 during his career,» says Viktor Pronyakin, product manager at Esports Charts, a Ukrainian analytical service that collects and analyzes data on viewing esports, sports, and entertainment events.
Among young Ukrainian Counter-Strike players, he notes, the most money was earned by 20-year-old Igor «w0nderful» Zhdanov, who also plays for Natus Vincere — he has just over $430,000 in prize money for his career. It should be noted that his teammate Valeriy «b1t» Vakhovsky did not make the rating, since he started playing for the main NAVI team before 2020 as a stand-in and even then helped the team win international tournaments.
Esports Charts is a Ukrainian analytics service that quickly collects and analyzes data on viewing of esports, sports and entertainment events. Since 2016, we have been working to make esports analytics more accessible and transparent for businesses and the wider esports fan community. We stand out in the market because we can analyze tournament information from various streaming platforms, providing comprehensive viewing statistics, as well as detailed analytics on players, esports organizations and disciplines — all in one centralized place.
In total, representatives of only three Ukrainian clubs were in this top: Natus Vincere (with players from three different squads), Passion UA, and B8 Esports.»
The rating is current for 2025, but may well change in the future (only income from prize money at official tournaments is taken into account, excluding salaries and from clubs, advertising contracts, tax deductions, etc.). Let’s talk about the players in more detail.
Edward is a legendary Ukrainian Counter-Strike player who played for pro100, DTS Gaming, HellRaisers and other teams, but spent most of his career as part of Natus Vincere. It was under the tag of «born to win» that Sukharev won several dozen international tournaments from 2012 to 2018 and earned over $720,000 during this time. Among his main achievements are victories at Intel Extreme Masters IV, ESL One: New York 2016, ESL One: Cologne 2018, BLAST Pro Series: Copenhagen 2018 and other tournaments. Edward continued to perform on the professional Counter-Strike scene until 2019, when he left NAVI.
Edward now primarily streams on Twitch, where his channel has over 38k subscribers. He streams ranked Counter-Strike matches for viewers, and often hosts joint streams with former teammates and various «retired Counter-Strike star players.»
Zeus is another legendary Ukrainian Counter-Strike player who was the captain of the first Natus Vincere team. He was the one who led the team when it won its first international tournaments and gained global recognition. Zeus' career is closely intertwined with Edward’s, as they spent many years side by side even before they started playing together in NAVI. However, there was a period when Teslenko left the Ukrainian club for one season and joined Gambit Esports, with whom he won the PGL Major Kraków 2017. This victory finally confirmed Zeus' status as one of the strongest captains in Eastern Europe. Almost immediately after that, Zeus returned to NAVI, won several more international tournaments, but was unable to repeat the championship success at the Major.
During his career as a player, Teslenko earned over $792,000. In parallel with playing on the professional stage, he also actively developed his social networks, led the media projects ZEUS CyberSchool and ZEUS Academy, led the revived pro100 team, opened computer clubs, starred in commercials, organized various businesses and startups. Teslenko now has over a million subscribers on various platforms, and regularly streams on Twitch and Kick, where he plays gambling games, discusses Counter-Strike news, and shoots vlogs of his travels to different countries.
There is hardly a single Dota 2 fan in the world who does not know who Dendi is. Ishutin began performing on the professional scene almost 20 years ago, back in the days of Dota Allstars. He played for teams such as DTS Gaming and KS.Int, but he truly achieved legendary status as a member of Natus Vincere, becoming the champion of The International 2011, the first esports tournament to award $1 million to the winner. At that time, such prize money was something that could only be dreamed of, so the victory of the Ukrainian team was discussed all over the world.
Dendi quickly converted his success into media fame. Valve even made a movie about him and released several cosmetic items for Dota 2 in his honor. Even when Dendi’s tournament results left much to be desired a few years later, he still remained the face of Dota 2, the main ambassador of the game and esports in general. During his career, Dendi won over $828,000 — this was enough for him to found his own esports organization, B8 Esports, after leaving NAVI in 2019. Several teams now play under this tag, including Counter-Strike and Valorant. Dendi himself has long since retrained from a player to a streamer, regularly hosts live broadcasts and is involved in the administration of B8.
In 2014, Lil was considered one of the most talented young players in Dota 2. His talent was quickly noticed by Virtus.pro, with whom he began to play in major tournaments. Lil’s professional career fell on the so-called «golden era» of VP, when this team was considered the strongest not only in Europe, but also on the international stage. Together with them, Ilyuk won several tournaments in the USA and Europe, and his best result can be called a victory at the ESL One Hamburg 2017 major. In total, the Ukrainian earned more than $940,000 in tournaments — most of this money he received while playing in a Virtus.pro shirt.
In the wake of his success and popularity, Ilyuk often made provocative statements on social media. He loved to trash-talk his opponents, which earned him a negative reputation in the community. Later, when his results began to decline, it became increasingly difficult for Ilyuk to find new teams. Eventually, he changed his role from a player to an analyst/expert in broadcast studios, and now he mostly streams on Twitch and gives private Dota 2 lessons.
B1t is a professional Counter-Strike player whose career is entirely tied to the Natus Vincere organization. Back in 2019, at the age of 15, he began playing in the NAVI Junior academy, and in 2021 he was transferred to the club’s main roster. Currently, b1t is the strongest Counter-Strike player in Ukraine, with victories at PGL Major Stockholm 2021, PGL Major Copenhagen 2024, and Esports World Cup 2024, as well as dozens of prize places at major international tournaments.
During his career, b1t has already earned over $1.4 million, and this amount will definitely increase in the near future, as Natus Vincere continues to actively perform in tournaments. The team currently occupies the fourth place in the ranking of the strongest Counter-Strike squads in the world. Unlike many other players, b1t practically does not conduct media activity and does not broadcast on Twitch, but devotes all his time to training and performing in tournaments with NAVI.
S1mple is a true legend of Natus Vincere, one of the strongest players in the history of Counter-Strike and the most popular esports player from Ukraine. He has several million followers on social networks, he gave lessons in the game to Neymar himself and other stars of big sports. Kostylev has 21 MVP medals, a victory at the PGL Major Stockholm 2021, won the Intel Grand Slam and dozens of championships in international tournaments with NAVI. In total, he earned more than $1.7 million in tournaments. S1mple was recognized as the best player in the world three times according to HLTV.org. He is the author of several iconic highlights in the history of Counter-Strike, which are even dedicated to special graffiti on the maps.
S1mple was a great player in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, but when Valve released Counter-Strike 2 with updated graphics and different shooting physics, he had a hard time adapting to the new version of the game. This greatly affected the player’s results and motivation. Since the end of 2023, s1mple has been inactive. He has practically stopped playing in tournaments, not counting short-term rentals and exhibition matches. Kostylev has several businesses, and recently launched his online school with Counter-Strike courses. Now s1mple sometimes streams on Twitch, but in recent years this has happened less and less.
Noone has been playing on the professional Dota 2 scene for over a decade, and the most successful period of his career fell on 2016-2020, when he was one of the leaders of the same «golden squad» Virtus.pro. Unlike Lil, whom we wrote about above, Minenko stayed with that team longer and together with it was able to win as many as five Dota 2 majors: in Hamburg, Katowice, Bucharest, Birmingham and Kuala Lumpur. It was during that period that the Ukrainian earned most of the prize money, the figure of which is gradually approaching $2 million.
Currently, Minenko continues to actively participate in Dota 2 tournaments. In October 2024, he joined the PARIVISON team, with which he has already won the championship at ESL One Bangkok 2024 and ESL One Raleigh 2025.
Resolut1on was once considered one of the most talented players in Dota 2, capable of playing virtually any hero and any position. He built a successful career with Team Empire, with which he won several major tournaments in Europe, after which he moved to play in North America. Fominok reached the finals of The International twice (and did so with two different teams), but he never managed to become the champion of the main tournament of the year. The Ukrainian player ended his playing career in mid-2023, having won over $2 million in prize money.
After retiring from the professional scene, Resolut1on tried his hand as an analyst and streamer. In recent years, he has been traveling a lot, recording podcasts, engaging in self-discovery and spiritual initiation, giving lectures on self-development, and giving advice on business coaching and mental wellness.
Mira is one of the few people in the world who can be said to have «passed Dota 2». Moreover, the Ukrainian did it twice, winning at The International 2021 and The International 2023. Both times Kolpakov became the champion as part of Team Spirit, the strongest team from Eastern Europe in recent years. In total, Mira earned over $5.5 million in tournaments. Most of this money he received just for The International 2021, where the Team Spirit players actually divided over $18 million between the five of them (not including payments to the coach and manager).
Mira has no media activity and practically no streams, as he continues to actively perform on the professional Dota 2 scene. In March 2025, he moved from Team Spirit to Aurora Gaming and has already managed to play with the new team at several championships. However, so far without any major achievements.
Yatoro is the youngest and richest player in the top Ukrainian esports teams. This 22-year-old Dota 2 genius was a member of Team Spirit’s golden squad, and unlike Mira, he continues to play for this team to this day. In many ways, it was thanks to Yatoro and his play on the cutting edge of the attack that Team Spirit was able to win its first The International championship title, and then repeat this success two years later.
During his professional career, Mulyarchuk has won over $5.6 million in Dota 2 tournaments — the first result in Ukraine and the seventh result among all esports athletes in all games. In general, we can say that he is one of the youngest millionaires not only in Dota 2, but also in the entire esports industry.
