Highest Paid WNBA Players (Now and All Time)

The WNBA enjoyed a boost in popularity with the arrival of Caitlin Clark, the former Iowa Hawkeyes star whose 2024 rookie season with the Indiana Fever brought historic attendance and TV ratings.

The increased attention and unprecedented success also brought WNBA salaries into the national spotlight.

With business booming, the WNBA Player's Association (WNBPA) elected to opt out of the current collective bargaining agreement. It hopes to negotiate higher salaries now that the league has a $2.2 billion media rights deal set to begin in 2026.

Understanding WNBA Salaries

Like the NBA, a "Standard Player Contract" is used as a template to determine WNBA player salaries, which were negotiated by the players union and league under the current CBA.

A rookie wage scale incentivizes players to prove their worth and cash in as free agents. WNBA salaries roughly range from a minimum of $66,000 to a super maximum contract of $250,000.

In the NBA, league revenue—also known as Basketball-Related Income (BRI) comprising television rights fees, sponsorships, ticket sales and merchandise sales—determines the salaries of players. Fifty percent of BRI goes to NBA player salaries under a salary cap system that limits team payrolls.

In the WNBA, 20% of league revenue goes to player salaries. The WNBA generates an estimated $200 million in BRI, but revenue is expected to skyrocket amid the Caitlin Clark Effect and a "monumental" media rights deal with Disney, NBC Universal and Amazon.

Current Highest-Paid WNBA Players

According to Spotrac, Las Vegas Aces guard Jackie Young is the highest-paid player in the WNBA with an annual average salary of $252,450.

Indiana Fever guard Kelsey Mitchell is second at $249,244, and Las Vegas Aces guard Jewell Loyd is third at $245,508. All three have made multiple All-Star teams and played in at least six WNBA seasons.

Seven of the top 11 earners finished among the top 20 in scoring average in 2024. Dallas Mavericks guard Arike Ogunbowale, who is fifth on the highest salaries list at $241,984, ranked second in scoring at 22.2 points per game.

But some of the WNBA's biggest stars are not in the top 10 in highest average annual salaries.

Las Vegas center A'ja Wilson, the reigning MVP who led the league in scoring at 26.9 points per game in 2024, makes $200,000 per season in her new two-year contract extension. However, the 28-year-old six-time All-Star signed a six-year extension last December with Nike that's reportedly worth $20 million.

Breanna Stewart and Sabrina Ionescu—stars of the defending champion New York Liberty—have annual average salaries of $208,400 and $205,030, respectively. Ionescu, the 2020 No. 1 overall pick who starred for the Oregon Ducks, has a signature shoe deal with Nike that is reportedly worth $24 million.

All-Time Highest Paid WNBA Players

The highest-paid players in NBA history are the league's current highest-paid players. Young, Mitchell, Loyd, Kahleah Copper and Ogunbowale also have the highest average salaries of all time.

According to Spotrac, the richest contracts in WNBA history belong to DeWanna Bonner, Elena Delle Donne and Skylar Diggins-Smith. All three deals were four-year, $889,480 supermax extensions in 2020.

While Bonner and Diggins-Smith got contracts with new teams (Connecticut Sun and Phoenix Mercury, respectively) in sign-and-trade moves, Delle Donne signed her supermax with the Washington Mystics but opted out of the 2020 season for health reasons during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Mystics paid her full salary.

Before Bonner, Delle Donne and Diggins-Smith got their record paydays, Seattle Storm guard Sue Bird held the record for richest contract. In 2016, the WNBA legend was the top free agent but chose to stay with the Storm on a five-year, $673,000 deal.

Why WNBA Stars Play Overseas for Bigger Paychecks

While WNBA players get to achieve their dreams of playing professionally before family and friends, they often supplement their incomes by playing in leagues outside the United States during the WNBA offseason.

Australia, China, France and Turkey are among the most popular destinations due to their strong professional women's basketball leagues. Players can make more than $1 million, which is quadruple the salary of top WNBA players.

Russia offered not only high salaries but also lavish amenities and accommodations that have been well-documented. Diana Taurasi, the recently retired 14-time all-WNBA guard and three-time WNBA champion, once skipped a season with Phoenix because Russian basketball was so lucrative.

“We had to go to a communist country to get paid like capitalists, which is so backward to everything that was in the history books in sixth grade,” Taurasi once said.

In 2022, Brittney Griner, Taurasi's teammate in the WNBA and in Russia, was traveling to her Russian team, UMMC Ekaterinburg, when she was arrested for having vape cartridges in her luggage. Griner spent 293 days in jail before being released as part of a prisoner swap. Her ordeal put a spotlight on the WNBA's lower salaries and the dangers of playing overseas.

The Fight for Pay Equity in the WNBA

Clark is the transcendent talent that could bring meaningful change to the WNBA's pay structure. Her popularity in college brought new fans to the WNBA and helped usher in a new era of prosperity for the league and in women's sports.

The big question is whether Clark and other stars coming from college—namely UConn Huskies guard Paige Bueckers and USC Trojans guard JuJu Watkins—will get to reap the rewards for elevating the WNBA. The WNBPA opting out of the current CBA is the next big step toward achieving pay equity with NBA salaries.

"The players made the decision to opt out of the last CBA to realign the business and save the league from its own limitations," WNBPA executive director Terri Jackson said.

First and foremost, the union wants a new economic model that "grows and evolves in step with the league's business success," a not-so-subtle demand that hints at the upcoming $2.2 billion media rights contract. It also seeks to ensure "players receive wages that properly reflect their value and contributions to the league's growing business."

Breanna Stewart, the perennial All-Star forward and leading scorer for the champion Liberty, hopes to see WNBA teams paying players as much as $1 million.

"Things that we want to be better, the time is coming," she said last October.