LeBron James keeps his crown for the 11th straight year with record earnings, leading a group of 10 stars making a combined $787 million this season.

_{By Brett Knight, Forbes Staff}

There is no active NBA player older than LeBron James, who will celebrate his 40th birthday in December. In fact, the Lakers’ superstar forward is older than three NBA head coaches—the Oklahoma City Thunder’s Mark Daigneault, the Utah Jazz’s Will Hardy and the Boston Celtics’ Joe Mazzulla—and was born the same year as three others, including his new boss in Los Angeles, JJ Redick.

Time may be winding down on James’ incomparable career, but like clockwork, he keeps outplaying younger rivals on the court—and outearning them off it.

For the 11th straight year, James is the NBA’s highest-paid player, collecting $48.7 million in salary for the 2024-25 season and an estimated $80 million annually from endorsements, licensing, memorabilia and other business endeavors. His $128.7 million total (before taxes and agent fees) is the highest in the 15-year history of Forbes’ NBA ranking, topping his $124.5 million haul from 2022-23.

When James’ run as basketball’s earnings king began, with his $64.6 million year in 2014-15, the NBA’s 10 top earners were raking in a combined $368 million, according to Forbes estimates. This year’s group more than doubles that total, at $787 million, which also beats 2022’s record of $751 million.

The new figure includes an estimated $293 million off the court, led by the Golden State Warriors’ Stephen Curry ($50 million), the Phoenix Suns’ Kevin Durant ($50 million) and the Milwaukee Bucks’ Giannis Antetokounmpo ($45 million) along with James. Only five active athletes from across the sports world—soccer’s Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, golf’s Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, and baseball’s Shohei Ohtani—make at least $45 million annually off the field, according to Forbes estimates.

The real story behind NBA players’ skyrocketing paychecks, however, is on the court. The league’s collective bargaining agreement ensures that players collectively take home around 50% of basketball-related income, and the NBA’s soaring revenue—roughly $13 billion last season—continues to give general managers more money to spend. In James’ first year as the NBA’s highest-paid player, his salary was $20.6 million; this season, 82 players will exceed that figure, according to contract database Spotrac.

Curry became the first player with a $50 million salary in 2023-24, and with the salary cap up to $140.6 million this season and the luxury tax threshold at $170.8 million—increases of more than 122% from a decade ago—the Philadelphia 76ers’ Joel Embiid, the Denver Nuggets’ Nikola Jokic and the Phoenix Suns’ Bradley Beal now join him in that stratosphere.

Meanwhile, the NBA signed new national media rights deals in July for a reported $76 billion over 11 years, more than two and a half times what the league has been receiving (by annual average). That should push up the salary cap by another 10%—the largest annual increase allowed under the current CBA—for the next several years.

So with Curry poised to break basketball’s $60 million-a-year ceiling in 2026-27—and the Boston Celtics’ Jayson Tatum crossing $70 million in 2029-30—the NBA will be seeing more record paydays in no time.

THE 10 HIGHEST-PAID NBA PLAYERS 2024

#1. $128.7 million

Age: 39 | Position: Forward | Team: Los Angeles Lakers | On-Court: $48.7 million • Off-Court: $80 million

After re-signing with the Lakers on a two-year, $104 million deal in July, James will make a bit of league history as the first father to line up alongside his son when he takes the court this week with Los Angeles rookie Bronny James. That continues his eventful 2024: In March, James became the first NBA player with 40,000 career points, and in July, he served as Team USA’s flag-bearer at the Paris Olympics’ opening ceremony.

Off the court, James—the first active NBA player to be named a billionaire by Forbes, in 2022—has added partnerships with DraftKings, Fanatics and Hennessy and invested in PGA Tour Enterprises, the golf tour’s new commercial arm. Meanwhile, his media company Uninterrupted produced the Vice TV docuseries Uninterrupted: The Real Stories of Basketball and the Netflix docuseries Starting 5—which features James as well as four other NBA stars—and spun off his talk show The Shop into its own business as it launched a men’s grooming line at Walmart. James also unveiled a new podcast called Mind the Game in March; however, its ninth episode ended up being its last after James’ co-host, JJ Redick, was hired as the Lakers’ new coach in June.