Highlights

• Friends remains one of the most iconic sitcoms, with its legendary cast, unforgettable storylines, and timeless humor still resonating today.
• The Friends cast started as relative newcomers, but through the show's massive success, their salaries skyrocketed to million-dollar episodes.
• Over the course of Friends' run, the cast collectively earned over $100 million each, with residuals continuing to boost their net worths significantly.

When the topic turns to the greatest sitcoms of the modern era, a significant number of people would point to Friends.

Friends is undisputedly the most popular and one of the highest-grossing sitcoms ever, and its fandom is still going strong — despite the passage of two intervening decades since the show drew to a close.

Everything about Friends is awesome: its characters are immortal, its storylines are exceptional, and its dialogue delivery and visual presentation are remarkable, and its well-timed jokes still draw laughs — even if several elements of Friends would "never fly in 2024."

To make a series interesting and relevant for ten seasons straight is nigh on impossible; well-earned kudos ought to go to David Crane and Marta Kauffman for pulling it off for the duration of the show's run.

While the Friends cast's compensation has long been a point of interest, its creators deservedly earned $550 million — along with executive producer Kevin S. Bright.

Each of the famed group of six, the main Friends cast, attained legendary status in the industry due to their impeccable performances as a bustling ensemble.

Due to the show's massive success, the entire Friends cast earned close to $1.5 billion and even today, they're raking in significant cash in the form of residuals from Friends.

After the beloved sitcom ended, each member of the Friends cast continued building impressive careers and amassing massive fortunes.

How much? Let's look at the Friends cast's eventually gargantuan salaries per episode, and examine how this blockbuster sitcom shaped their Hollywood futures, as well as their fortunes.

Editor’s note: This article contains mentions of substance abuse disorders, drug addiction, opiates, or other related topics that may be triggering to some readers. If you or someone you know is struggling with addiction or drug abuse disorder, please visit SAMHSA.gov.

The Friends Cast's Pay In Early Seasons

On September 22nd 1994, NBC aired the first episode of Friends, titled "The One Where It All Began."

In the very first minute of Friends, a hilarious moment occurred — this intro hooked the audience, and maintained its hold for the entire series run.

During that initial scene, Monica Geller (Courteney Cox) said:

"Okay, everybody, relax, this is not even a date ... it's just two people going out to dinner and not having sex."

In response, Chandler Bing (the late Matthew Perry) retorted:

"Sounds like a date to me":

It's hard to imagine now, but in 1994, the Friends cast was composed of virtual newcomers, not the big names we know today.

At that time, David Schwimmer (Ross Geller), Jennifer Aniston (Rachel Green), Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe Buffay), Matt LeBlanc (Joey Tribbiani), Matthew Perry (Chandler Bing), and Courteney Cox (Monica) were fledgling actors hoping the show would get picked up.

However, the actors now known primarily as the core Friends cast had been working in film and on television for years.

In fact, some were involved with relatively high-profile projects prior to Friends:

Throughout the first season, they had no idea this sitcom would become a cataclysmic turning point in their lives and careers.

And in its first season, the six titular buddies of Friends were paid a modest $22,500 per episode.

There were 24 episodes in the first season, which suggests the main Friends cast earned a decent amount, about $540,000 per season.

Adjusted for inflation, the Friends cast's season one episodic pay rates work out to around $48,068 per episode, and $1,153,620 per season.

The Friends Cast Teams Up Off-Screen

After the decent first season, Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe), Matt LeBlanc (Joey), Matthew Perry (Chandler), and Courteney Cox (Monica) continued to receive salaries on par with their initial $22,500 rate.

But allegedly, the producers of Friends raised both Aniston and Schwimmer's per episode pay to $40,000, after the pair quickly became the show's center of attention.

Nevertheless, it all changed in season three when, for the first time in acting history, the Friends cast collectively bargained to negotiate their salaries.

At the end of that collective bargaining, the Friends cast negotiated a massive pay raise — $75,000 per episode, or $1.875 million per season.

This moment synchronistically echoed one of Friends' scenes, when Rachel (Aniston) spoke with her father on the phone, saying:

Well, maybe I don’t need your money ... Wait, wait, I said maybe!

While the character Rachel was unsure, in real life, Aniston herself likely wasn't — she and her Friends co-stars didn't need to borrow money from anyone, because their talent paid off.

In the sitcom's fourth season, the Friends cast upped their salary by another $10,000, a raise to $85,000 per episode — and with it, they broke into "$2 million a season" territory.

By the time the fifth season of Friends rolled around, its tight-knit cast, on-screen and off, had become household names across the world.

Friends was at its peak, earning a shower of accolades and acclaim from viewers and critics — and as such, the network and show's producers made it rain in terms of money.

In season five, the Friends cast commanded $100,000 per episode, or $2.4 million per season.

Ahead of the sixth season, the cast negotiated for another raise; producers obliged because the show's reach and runaway popularity made it lucrative for all parties involved.

After that raise, the Friends cast began earning $125,000 an episode, and around $3.12 million a season.

The Friends Cast's Unbelievable Late Season Pay Spike

The first six seasons were just the beginning in terms of pay hikes, as Friends attained "epic TV" status by the time season seven arrived.

Everyone was buzzing about Ross' awkward and affectionate personality, Monica's peculiar and domineering character, Chandler's strange but brilliant wit, Rachel's outlandish and flighty endeavors, Joey's inability to understand everyone's behavior, and Phoebe's delightfully unfiltered utterances.

The Friends cast were already bona fide superstars — but by season seven, they dominated the small screen, earning the six-fold pay raise mentioned above.

Each member of the core Friends cast earned more than $36 million for seasons seven and eight.

But Friends shattered all records, and its six talented stars secured a salary of seven figures – a magical number – for one episode.

Courteney Cox, Jennifer Aniston, and Lisa Kudrow were the first women in the industry to receive a paycheck of $1 million for a single episode.

This marked the first instance where all six members of the Friends cast earned $1 million for one episode, or $1.68 million when adjusted for inflation.

In the last two seasons of Friends, each main cast member earned a truly outstanding $41 million in salary alone, not counting things like endorsement-related income.

These salary increases were incremental, but examined together, they illustrate the financial juggernaut that was (and is) Friends:

How The Friends Cast's Net Worths Were Shaped By Its Success

Calculating the combined compensation for the Friends cast, they earned more than $87 million in salaries alone over a decade.

As for the extraordinarily lucrative rights to Friends, they're held by industry titan Warner Bros., which is also a distributor.

When Warner Bros. granted rights to air Friends on broadcast television or streaming platforms, each cast member was entitled to two percent from the deal.

Warner Bros. has raked in a staggering $1 billion from Friends to date, which means each of the six titular friends earned $20 million from residuals and syndication (on top of their show salaries).

In other words, every core Friends cast member earned more than $100 million from the sitcom, and they are still getting checks to this day.

The ensemble cast of Friends pursued their careers and added more to their fortunes through subsequent roles, but Friends is likely to always be their biggest source of income:

The Cast Of Friends' Estimated Net Worths Today:

Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimmer, and Jennifer Aniston remain busy, in versatile roles in movies and on television.

In fact, Jennifer Aniston is again the highest-paid television actress, a title jointly held along with Reese Witherspoon.

Aniston is now earning $2 million per episode for the AppleTV+ series The Morning Show, and she is also the richest member of the Friends cast.

Courteney Cox last appeared in the underrated Starz horror comedy Shining Vale, which was unfortunately canceled in December 2023.

However, she's warming up for bigger roles. In late February, rumors that Cox was slated to join the popular BBC reality show The Traitors began appearing in the press.

Matt LeBlanc took a hiatus from acting, and last appeared on-screen in Man With a Plan in 2020. With respect to upcoming projects, LeBlanc relatably quipped:

"I'm just enjoying not having to do anything — it’s been kinda nice. Sorry, I’ll let you know when I do [another project]."

That brings us to arguably the most beloved member of the Friends cast, Matthew Perry, who openly grappled with alcoholism and substance-use disorder for years, and spent $9 million on rehab to combat it.

On October 28th, Perry was found dead at the age of 54, due to "acute effects of ketamine," a medication dispensed to treat his illness.

Perry's untimely and unexpected death shattered the cast of Friends, and they issued a joint statement on October 30th mourning him.

Though Perry is no longer with us, his legacy as Chandler Bing remains — as do his witty retorts and classic lines, like "I'm not great at the advice, can I interest you in a sarcastic comment?"