How Roblox Is Fueling Careers Across the USA

• To better understand Roblox’s impact on the U.S. economy, we’re releasing the results of our first economic and social impact report.

• While Roblox does not employ creators, between 2017 and 2023, the direct and indirect impact of our Developer Exchange (DevEx) Program* was nearly 18,000 full-time job equivalents** across the country.

• Of the respondents who monetize on our platform, 38% said they wouldn’t have earned income from making interactive content without Roblox. And 56% said they don’t develop for any other platforms.

• We also found many of our U.S. creators are based in regions far from the large, coastal cities typically associated with technology.

Every day, 79.5 million users*** come to Roblox to visit millions of experiences and engage with millions of 3D items made by our community of creators. During the 12 months ended June 30, 2024, we distributed $803 million to our global creator community, up 18% over the previous 12 months. These creators, who build the experiences, avatars, and items available on Roblox, live across the U.S., including many in regions not typically associated with technology.

To enable the creation of anything, anywhere, by anyone, we have invested in a robust suite of tools, available via Roblox Studio, the most accessible 3D development tool in the world. With Studio, any creator can find an audience, publish globally in seconds, and iterate rapidly. Creators come to Roblox for many reasons: Some create on Roblox to learn how to code or make games, some are driven by the fun of creating, and some are interested in monetizing their creations and building a business on Roblox. Knowing this, we wanted to better understand how Roblox has influenced people’s businesses and impacted the economies in areas not traditionally associated with the technology industry.

To that end, we are publicly sharing the results of our first study of Roblox’s U.S. economic and social impact****. Published by Nordicity, a leading economic analysis firm, the report showcases the size and scale of our creator community and its economic benefits in the U.S. In fact, 44% of the 147 creators surveyed from communities outside of traditional technology hubs said that, without Roblox, they likely wouldn’t be creating or working in technology, starting businesses, or connecting with top brands or artists. We’re proud to have had a hand in facilitating their success.

Our Support of U.S. Creators Also Has an Economic Impact

People of all ages and backgrounds create on Roblox. While some create for the joy of playing with friends, others go on to pursue careers in technology or gaming by monetizing the experiences, 3D models, avatars, outfits, or accessories they create. Our research showed in the U.S., between 2017 and 2023, we generated an estimated GDP of $1.2 billion. In 2023 alone, we generated an estimated GDP of $345 million. While Roblox does not employ creators, the direct and indirect impact of our Developer Exchange program during that 7-year period was 17,840 full-time job equivalents** and contributed $324 million in tax revenue***** to the U.S. economy between 2017 and 2023. In the past year alone, more than 7,500 of the 5.5 million U.S. creators monetizing on Roblox made more than $650.

We support creators throughout their journey as they build their businesses with the tools and features available on Roblox. Recently, we launched even more features to help them, including the ability to publish immersive ads, the ability to sell on the Creator Store, in-experience purchases, and an easier way for more creators to create, sell, and resell avatar items.

Our Economic Impact Benefits Communities Across the U.S.

The report shows creators across the U.S., including outside the large, coastal cities typically associated with the technology industry, are taking advantage of the economic opportunities Roblox provides. According to the report, half of the creators bringing in the equivalent of full-time earnings on Roblox in the U.S. from 2017-2023 were in areas nowhere near cities with large, established technology industries.

For example, the developer MrWindy lives in Utah, where he works full-time running Flee the Facility, an adventure game that’s been played more than 4.5 billion times. He’d always loved playing video games, but after discovering Roblox, his passion turned to making games. About a year after he began developing on Roblox, he was able to fully support himself with the earnings from Flee the Facility. What’s more, he found a like-minded community in Roblox. “I enjoy connecting with others who get me and know what I am working towards,” he says.

We Provide a Way to Become a Developer With Little to No Upfront Cost

For millions of people, Roblox represents a low-barrier path to creating 3D experiences, games, and items. We seek to provide creators with everything they need to take their ideas from concept to reality. This goal is at the heart of everything we do, from the developer tools we build to the developer events we host. As a result, there are developers of all experience levels and teams of all sizes — from two-person teams to large developer studios — who are succeeding on Roblox. In fact, our survey found that 38% of the 384 respondents who monetize on our platform would not have made money from developing interactive content without Roblox.

This number is especially exciting to us, since fostering the creator community is core to what we do at Roblox. Based on conversations with many exceptional creators, we found they started out playing on Roblox, began building for fun, learned to code and build worlds on the platform, then built successful careers on Roblox and in the broader STEM field. That was made possible because of our foundation as an advanced development environment built on real-world physics. And with emerging technology like AI powering tools like Assistant, learning becomes accessible to a wider range of curious creators.

For example, Nevada’s alertcoderf had never been interested in math. But as he watched other Roblox creators in his early days on the platform, his eyes were opened to how integral math was to thinking like a programmer — a dream of his since his early days on Roblox. “Seeing what other people [were] making led me to want to figure out how I [could] learn from them,” he says. “You start asking questions and developing connections to participate in the cool things people are doing and making.” He then progressed quickly from building his first game to being the head of Twin Atlas, which runs popular experiences like Creatures of Sonaria and Dragon Adventures and has become one of the largest Roblox developer studios.

Many professional Roblox creators are solo entrepreneurs, while others, like alertcoderf, are using their earnings to hire employees and build teams. Other studios grow and scale to tens or hundreds of employees, such as alertcoderf and Twin Atlas. We’re proud that we’ve created a market where individuals, small studios, and large studios alike have the potential to operate profitably.

We are committed to fostering a partnership with our community and we’re proud of the steady growth in the number of people who are creating on our platform. Roblox is one of the largest creative communities in the world, and we’re working every day to expand the opportunity to create.

The economic and social impact report illustrates that any U.S. creator with the necessary time, skill, effort, and strategy has the opportunity to make a career out of building on our platform, no matter where they are located. We provide the tools, scale, and monetization pathways to help them do so. And we’ll support them, whether it’s a small indie development studio in Nevada or an aspiring artist in Utah. No matter who it is, we can’t wait to see the great things our creator community will build as it expands.