--- title: MLM Income Statistics 2026 | Real Distributor Earnings Data | FlawlessMLM description: 🔵 What do MLM distributors actually earn? Data-driven analysis of income disclosure statements from 15+ companies. Median earnings, success rates, and what the numbers mean for your business. url: https://flawlessmlm.com/en/blog/mlm-income-statistics last_updated: '2026-08-12' language: en type: article keywords: mlm income statistics, mlm income disclosure, network marketing income statistics, mlm earnings data, mlm success rate statistics, average mlm income, how much do mlm distributors make, mlm income, mlm earnings, network marketing income, mlm distributors, income disclosure statement, mlm success rate, network marketing earnings, mlm compensation plan category: MLM Basics published_date: 18.06.2026 --- # MLM Income Statistics 2026: What Distributors Really Earn (Data-Driven Analysis) By Oleksandr Honcharov, CEO at FlawlessMLM Updated on June, 2026 Only 0.05% of MLM distributors ever earn $100,000 or more in a year, according to the [AARP Foundation](https://www.aarp.org/content/dam/aarp/aarp_foundation/2018/pdf/AARP%20Foundation%20MLM%20Research%20Study%20Report%2010.8.18.pdf). Half of the rest lose money. That gap is the entry point for any serious read of MLM income statistics. After reviewing 70 publicly available income disclosure statements, the Federal Trade Commission found that the MLM income statistics behind every recruiting pitch tell the same story: most MLM distributors earned $1,000 or less per year before expenses ([FTC Staff Report, 2024](https://www.ftc.gov/)). In at least 17 of the 70 MLMs reviewed, the typical participant earned nothing at all. This article walks through real MLM earnings data company by company, with verifiable sources for every number you see. Key Takeaways: MLM Income Statistics at a Glance * Across 70 MLM income disclosure statements reviewed in the 2024 FTC report, most MLM distributors earned $1,000 or less per year before expenses, which is less than $84 per month (FTC, 2024). * Amway's own 2024 income disclosure statement shows average MLM income of $723 per year for IBOs at Founders Platinum and below, with 38% reporting no product sales (Amway, 2024). * Global network marketing income statistics cover 104.3 million independent contractors, with 72.1% of those direct sellers identifying as female (WFDSA, 2024). * Truth in Advertising's 2024 investigation of 100 MLM companies found that 98% used atypical or unsubstantiated income claims while real MLM earnings data tell a different story (TINA.org, 2024). The summary table below compiles MLM earnings data from ten companies that publish or have had their figures audited. Company IDS Year Avg Annual Earnings (USD) % Earned $0 / Inactive Plan Type Source Amway (U.S.) 2024 $723 (IBOs, Founders Platinum and below) 38% had no sales Stairstep Breakaway Amway IDS Herbalife (U.S.) 2016 Not separately disclosed 86% of U.S. members received no earnings Multi-tier FTC v. Herbalife Nu Skin (U.S.) 2022 Not disclosed publicly 76% earned no commission in average month Stairstep Nu Skin IDS via TINA LifeVantage (U.S.) 2023 $683 (Consultants who earned during period) Inactive participants excluded Unilevel LifeVantage IDS Plexus Worldwide (U.S.) 2024 $758 (all Brand Ambassadors) 41% inactive Unilevel Plexus IDS MONAT (U.S.) 2023 $987 (all Market Partners, before expenses) 41% inactive Unilevel MONAT IDS Mary Kay (Canada) 2024 CAD $211 (eligible IBCs only) 88.3% not eligible for commissions Stairstep Mary Kay IDS BODi / Beachbody (U.S.) 2023 $742 (all U.S. Brand Ambassadors) 90.37% outside Leadership Comp Plan Unilevel BODi IDS doTERRA (U.S.) 2023 Top 50% Wellness Advocates < $250/yr Majority earned $0 Unilevel doTERRA IDS via TINA FTC aggregate review 2024 (n=70) Most participants earned $1,000 or less 17 of 70: typical participant earned $0 Mixed FTC Staff Report 2024 The sections below cover each company and each statistic in detail. ## How Much Do MLM Distributors Actually Make? Median vs Average Earnings The answer to how much do MLM distributors make depends on which metric you trust. The MLM income statistics most companies publish are averages, and average MLM income overstates reality because a handful of high earners pull the mean upward. Median MLM income statistics tell you what the person in the middle of the field actually takes home, and that number sits dramatically lower. Amway's 2024 income disclosure statement makes the gap visible. The average MLM income for U.S. IBOs at Founders Platinum and below came in at $723 before expenses. The top 50% of IBOs earned a median of $539 per year, and 38% reported zero sales at all (Amway, 2024). When 38% of the sample sits at zero, the mean is already an optimistic measure of average MLM income. The 2024 FTC staff report confirmed the same pattern across the industry. Across 70 income disclosure statements analyzed, most MLM distributors earned $1,000 or less per year before expenses (FTC Staff Report, 2024). That figure is gross MLM income, not net of starter kits or qualifying purchases. According to the Federal Trade Commission, in at least 17 of the 70 MLMs reviewed in 2024, the typical participant did not make any money at all. (FTC Staff Report, 2024) The wage question matters. How much do MLM distributors make compared to a part-time job at $15 an hour? At $1,000 in annual MLM income and roughly 15 hours of weekly activity, the implied wage runs below $1.30 per hour before deducting product purchases. That gap is why MLM income statistics now sit at the center of FTC enforcement discussions, and why network marketing income statistics regularly show up in consumer-protection casework. How much do MLM distributors make in a country with stronger disclosure rules?  Mary Kay published Canadian MLM income statistics showing average MLM income of CAD $211 for the 11.7% of consultants eligible for commissions. The other 88.3% earned zero in commission. That distribution is the realistic answer to how much do MLM distributors make once you stop reading top-rank averages. The MLM income statistics behind any recruiting deck look very different from the MLM income statistics behind the legal disclosure. We see one more pattern across MLM consulting work. Founders building their first MLM company model commissions on top-rank examples, then discover six months in that 80% of their network never reaches the qualifying rank. The MLM compensation plan engine has to be configured for the actual distribution of activity, not the aspirational one. Our [analysis of MLM versus pyramid scheme structures](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/blog/mlm-vs-pyramid-scheme) covers that line in detail. The question of how much do MLM distributors make also comes up in nearly every initial consulting call. One founder put it bluntly last quarter: "I just need to know what a real MLM distributor earns in year one, not the success-story slide."  ## MLM Income Disclosure Statements: What 15+ Companies Reveal An income disclosure statement is the document an MLM voluntarily publishes to show what its MLM distributors actually earn. U.S. federal law does not require any income disclosure statement to be published. Some states have proposed legislation. The Direct Selling Self-Regulatory Council has issued voluntary standards. None of that carries the force of an enforceable FTC rule. That voluntary status shapes what every MLM income disclosure tells you. The 2024 FTC staff report observed that most income disclosure statements emphasize top-rank earnings while burying the percentage of participants earning zero (FTC, 2024). The headline number you see is usually the average MLM income statistics for a small subset of active distributors. The MLM earnings data hidden in fine print include people who paid the registration fee and never sold a unit. Below is MLM earnings data pulled directly from the most recent published income disclosure documents for 15 companies. Plexus Worldwide reports a 2024 average MLM income of $758 for all U.S. Brand Ambassadors, with 41% of Market Partners classified as inactive [(Plexus 2024 IDS)](https://static.plexusworldwide.com/cdn/income-disclosure-statement-en-us.pdf). The Plexus MLM income disclosure follows the same structural pattern as most published documents, with the MLM income statistics on the front page reflecting active earners and the percentage of zero-earning participants buried below. LifeVantage states the average 12-month earnings of a "typical Consultant who earned during the Period" at $683 [(LifeVantage IDS)](https://www.lifevantage.com/legal/us-en/income-disclosure-statement). Read that phrase carefully. The figure excludes consultants who earned zero, which is the larger share of the field. The MLM income disclosure does not publish a separate count of those zero-earning consultants in its top-line summary of MLM earnings data. Mary Kay's 2024 Canadian income disclosure statement showed 11.7% of Independent Beauty Consultants eligible for commissions, with that eligible subset averaging CAD $211 for the year [(Mary Kay 2024 IDS review)](https://www.pinktruth.com/2025/05/26/mary-kay-income-disclosures/). The U.S. version is not published in the same format. National Sales Directors, the top 0.04% of the sales force, averaged CAD $122,000 in 2024, down from CAD $149,440 the prior year. The MLM income statistics inside the Mary Kay MLM income disclosure tell you exactly how concentrated the top of the field is, and how thin the network marketing income statistics are everywhere else. Nu Skin's 2022 figures showed 23.58% of active U.S. Brand Affiliates earned a sales compensation payment in an average month. That leaves more than 76% of those MLM distributors with no payment in any given month [(Nu Skin IDS via TINA.org)](https://truthinadvertising.org/articles/mlms-continue-to-recruit-with-deceptive-earnings-claims/). The Nu Skin MLM income disclosure does not present this percentage on the front page. The number sits inside a paragraph explaining how "active" is defined. Herbalife remains the reference point because of the 2016 FTC settlement. Herbalife's own filing stated that 86% of U.S. members (466,926 people) received no earnings in the year reviewed [(Bäckman, 2022)](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/cfp2.1137). The FTC settlement returned $200 million in partial refunds to roughly 350,000 MLM distributors who lost money under the prior model. MONAT's 2023 MLM income disclosure reported $987 average for all Market Partners before expenses, with 41% inactive [(MONAT IDS aggregation)](https://www.homebusinesswatch.com/income-disclosure). The company acknowledged in the same document that distributor expenses "may exceed the amounts earned." The phrase "you may lose money" sits in the MLM income disclosure itself. Eight more companies publish an income disclosure statement in varying formats: doTERRA and BODi (formerly Beachbody) lead the consumer wellness category. Beautycounter and Color Street published their MLM earnings data through DSA filings. USANA and Isagenix sit in the supplement category. Modere and Le-Vel round out the eight [(TINA.org income claim database)](https://truthinadvertising.org/evidence/2023-doterra-income-claims-database/). The pattern stays consistent across the group. Top-rank earnings figures occupy the visual foreground of every MLM income disclosure. Counts of inactive or zero-earning MLM distributors sit in footnotes. MLM earnings data presented this way obscures more than it reveals. We see this MLM income disclosure pattern often in compliance audits we run for clients considering U.S. or EU launches. Our MLM consultants flag the same three gaps each time: missing expense disclosure, undefined "active distributor" terminology, and a missing distinction between gross and net network marketing earnings. The internal MLM income disclosure template we use is built to close those gaps from day one, which is why the [FlawlessMLM consulting team](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/mlm-consulting) treats MLM income disclosure structure as a launch-readiness item, not a marketing piece. Build the income disclosure before the launch.  [Schedule a free strategy session](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/contacts) ## MLM Success Rate Statistics: The Numbers Behind the Promises MLM success rate statistics expose the largest gap between recruiting language and audited outcomes. The marketing implies that effort plus consistency converts to income. The MLM success rate statistics describe a different distribution. Jon M. Taylor's analysis of 350 MLM compensation plan structures for the FTC concluded that 99% of MLM distributors lose money once you subtract qualifying purchases and operating expenses [(Taylor / FTC public comment)](https://www.ftc.gov/sites/default/files/documents/public_comments/trade-regulation-rule-disclosure-requirements-and-prohibitions-concerning-business-opportunities-ftc.r511993-00008%20/00008-57281.pdf). Taylor's MLM success rate of 0.4% profitability sits below the rate of profitable participants at a casino roulette table. The FTC's later staff work echoed Taylor's MLM success rate finding. The 2024 staff report on 70 income disclosure statements found that the vast majority of MLM distributors received $1,000 or less per year in MLM earnings. The MLM success rate statistics derived from the same dataset put the percentage of participants who break even after expenses below 1% for most companies reviewed. Those MLM income statistics align with every independent academic estimate produced in the last decade. The AARP Foundation's 2018 national survey of more than 600 MLM participants softens the 99% number without changing the underlying picture. AARP found that 47% of MLM distributors lost money, 27% broke even, and only 25% made a profit [(AARP Foundation, 2018)](https://www.aarp.org/work/job-search/advice-for-job-seekers-tempted-by-multilevel-marketing-offers/). Inside that profitable quarter, more than half earned less than $5,000 for the year. Only 0.05% earned $100,000 or more. The AARP study and the FTC analysis disagree on the exact percentage who lose money, and they agree completely on the shape of the distribution. What MLM success rate statistics don't capture is the time investment behind the network marketing earnings. The DSEF Economic Impact study calculated $111.4 billion in U.S. economic contribution from direct selling in 2022 [(DSEF, 2024)](https://businesswire.com/news/home/20240702990349/en/Direct-Selling-Channel-Delivers-111-Billion-Annual-Economic-Impact-to-U.S.-Economy-New-Study-Finds/). The U.S. count of MLM distributors and direct sellers in 2024 came in at 5.4 million, with $34.7 billion in retail sales [(DSA, 2025)](https://www.dsa.org/events/news/individual-press-release/us-direct-selling-association-releases-2025-growth-outlook-study-2024-data-shows-steady-interest-in-direct-selling). Divide that retail revenue by sellers and you get $6,426 per seller per year. That is gross sales volume. Net network marketing earnings sit far below it. Network marketing income statistics consistently produce the same shape: a thin top, a long tail, and a large zero category. That distribution is structural. A binary MLM compensation plan rewards depth, which means the second hire matters more than the tenth and the first matters more than either. A unilevel MLM compensation plan rewards width with a depth cap, which means breakaways pull network marketing earnings away from the people who built them. Each MLM compensation plan logic produces its own profile of who earns and who does not. The structural question, covered in our [discussion of whether MLM is legal](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/blog/is-mlm-legal), feeds straight back into the MLM success rate statistics on every published disclosure. Founders ask about MLM success rate statistics during nearly every initial scoping call. The honest answer is that a well-designed MLM compensation plan does not change the long-tail distribution. It changes whether the bottom 80% leave after one commission cycle or stay for three. The MLM compensation plan controls retention. Product, price, and consumer demand control whether anyone in the bottom 80% has a reason to remain. MLM success rate statistics on retention move when the plan moves, not when the marketing copy changes. ## Income Distribution in Network Marketing: Top 1% vs the Rest The defining feature of network marketing income statistics is the shape of the distribution. The top 1% of MLM distributors capture a disproportionate share of total commissions paid out. That concentration runs more extreme than in most legitimate sales organizations, and it shows up clearly in network marketing income statistics across every company that publishes data. Take Mary Kay's Canadian numbers as a worked example of network marketing income. National Sales Directors represent roughly 0.04% of the sales force and averaged CAD $122,000 in 2024. Sales Directors, 1.6% of the field, averaged CAD $19,658. Independent Beauty Consultants eligible for commissions, the 11.7% who actually qualified, averaged CAD $211 in network marketing earnings. Everyone else earned nothing in commission terms. The same shape appears in Amway's network marketing income figures. The published average network marketing income for IBOs at Founders Platinum and below is $723, including those reporting zero sales. Above Founders Platinum the network marketing earnings picture changes completely. Diamond IBOs earn six-figure network marketing income, but Diamond rank typically represents fractions of one percent of the active field. The network marketing income statistics across both halves of the ladder come from the same disclosure document. The MLM income statistics for the bottom of the ladder are simply rarely highlighted in recruiting materials. In Mary Kay's 2024 Canadian income disclosure, National Sales Directors represented 0.04% of the sales force, while 88.3% of Independent Beauty Consultants were not eligible for commissions at all. (Mary Kay 2024 IDS) Why does network marketing income concentrate so heavily at the top?  The MLM compensation plan mathematically rewards depth and width together, and only early position holders accumulate both. A binary leg with three generations below it generates network marketing earnings the new recruit at level four will never replicate. The first 100 MLM distributors in a fast-growing network capture an outsized share of lifetime payouts because their downlines fill in around them. Late entrants do not have the same opportunity unless the MLM compensation plan resets or compresses ranks. That dynamic creates a planning problem for founders. If 80% of the network earns under $1,000 in year one network marketing income, retention drops by month nine. We see this across the projects we audit. A network with weak first-rank economics loses 50% to 70% of its registered field inside the first commission year. The fix lives in the MLM compensation plan, not in the marketing copy. A retention-tier bonus that pays something to the active middle changes the network marketing income curve more than any top-rank incentive ever does. Across 400+ MLM platforms we have built, the founders who survive year two are the ones who modeled the bottom 70% of the rank distribution in advance. Our [full FlawlessMLM project portfolio](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/clients) carries case-by-case retention curves for reference. For deeper mechanics on how MLM compensation plan type shapes network marketing income statistics, our [analysis of MLM network marketing statistics](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/blog/mlm-network-marketing-statistics) covers each plan family in turn: binary and unilevel structures first, then matrix and stairstep alternatives. Each family has its own configurable thresholds that determine whether the middle of the field earns or does not. [Model the middle, not the top](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/contacts) ## MLM Earnings Data by Company: Side-by-Side Comparison Table The extended comparison below pulls MLM earnings data, percentage of inactive participants, and MLM compensation plan type from each company's most recent published income disclosure statement. The summary table at the top of this article carries condensed MLM earnings data with sources. Three caveats apply to every number in the comparison. Average is not median, and most companies do not publish the median. Expenses are excluded from disclosed MLM earnings data. "Active" definitions vary by company. Some MLM income disclosure documents require monthly product purchases. Others allow zero-volume registration to count as active. Company Year Disclosed Avg (USD) Inactive / Zero Notable Detail Amway 2024 $723 (all IBOs, Founders Platinum and below) 38% had no sales Median top 50% earned $539; 60% received at least one payment Plexus Worldwide 2024 $758 (all U.S. Brand Ambassadors) 41% Market Partners inactive Median not disclosed in standard format MONAT 2023 $987 (all Market Partners) 41% inactive, no commissions Disclosure explicitly states "you may lose money" LifeVantage 2023 $683 (Consultants who earned during period) Zero-earning Consultants excluded Top rank earners pull published mean upward BODi / Beachbody 2023 $742 (all U.S. Brand Ambassadors) 90.37% outside Leadership Comp Plan Median not disclosed Mary Kay (Canada) 2024 CAD $211 (eligible IBCs only) 88.3% not eligible for commissions NSDs earned CAD $122,000; 0.04% of sales force Nu Skin 2022 Not disclosed by company 76% earned no commission in average month 23.58% of active Brand Affiliates earned in average month Herbalife (FTC settlement) 2016 Refunds averaged ~$571 per distributor 86% of U.S. members received no earnings $200M FTC settlement covered ~350,000 distributors doTERRA 2023 Top 50% Wellness Advocates earned <$250/yr Majority earned $0 Premium pricing model amplifies the tail FTC aggregate (n=70) 2024 Most participants earned $1,000 or less 17 of 70 MLMs: typical participant earned $0 No reviewed disclosure accounted for expenses Across the 70 income disclosure statements analyzed in the FTC 2024 review, none of the disclosures accounted for distributor expenses (FTC, 2024). That single omission can flip a positive average into a net loss for the middle of the network marketing income distribution. Honest MLM income statistics have to include expenses. The internal benchmark we use when building a [compliant MLM commission software module](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/mlm-commission-software) captures gross commission, retail margin, qualifying purchase volume, and per-rank participation percentage. The result is an income disclosure statement that generates from real ledger data, not from marketing-friendly slicing of MLM earnings data or selectively reported MLM income statistics. ## What MLM Income Statistics Mean for Founders and Distributors For founders, MLM income statistics are not a warning to avoid the model. The MLM income statistics in every disclosure are a blueprint for what to build around. A long-tail distribution is structural, not fixable. What you can control is whether the middle of the distribution stays active long enough to find product-market fit, and whether the bottom of the distribution exits at a loss small enough not to generate complaints. The MLM income statistics that matter for your business are the ones describing your middle, not your top. Three operational decisions move the MLM income statistics more than any other. 1\. The first is starter kit cost. A $50 kit produces a smaller refund pool than a $400 kit when MLM distributors quit. The Herbalife $200 million FTC settlement was driven in part by the cumulative scale of starter-kit and qualifying-purchase costs across hundreds of thousands of inactive MLM distributors. A founder who keeps registration fees minimal and lets MLM distributors earn product through volume avoids that liability. 2\. The second is autoship structure. Autoship as a qualification gate creates one set of incentives. Autoship as an optional convenience creates a different one. Companies that tie rank qualification to a mandatory monthly purchase generate stronger short-term volume and higher one-year churn. Across the platforms we have built, autoship-optional configurations retain MLM distributors 18 to 24 months longer on average than mandatory-autoship configurations. 3\. The third is rank ladder design inside the MLM compensation plan. A ladder with reachable mid-ranks produces a different network marketing income curve than a ladder optimized for the top. Mid-rank reachability is the single biggest factor in the percentage of MLM distributors who earn at least their starter-kit cost back in year one. Strong mid-rank economics also shift the MLM success rate statistics that founders care about in year two. Global Trend ran into a version of all three problems in 2017. The company had 42,000 partners on Excel-managed compensation, with no rank threshold visibility for partners and no automated kit-cost tracking. The MLM income statistics for that period showed roughly 70% of the field inactive. Our team rebuilt the platform with a binary system, six bonus types, ten-language support, and a partner dashboard that showed every distributor where they stood on every rank metric in real time. Seven years later, Global Trend operates with more than 2 million users. The state recognized the company twice as one of the largest taxpayers in the beauty industry.  That growth followed the platform rebuild, not the marketing campaign. For distributors, the same MLM income statistics carry a different lesson. Read the income disclosure statement before you join, not after. Find the published median in any MLM income disclosure. If only the average MLM income is published, multiply by 0.4 and you will be closer to the actual middle of the network marketing earnings distribution. Ask the recruiter how many people at your level earned more than the starter-kit cost in the prior 12 months. If the recruiter cannot answer with a specific percentage, the income disclosure statement is not being explained to you in good faith. The MLM income statistics either back the pitch or contradict it. We acknowledge a limit to this analysis of MLM income statistics. An income disclosure statement describes historical network marketing earnings for one company at one moment. The statement cannot predict what an individual distributor will earn. A high-conviction product with high consumer reorder rates produces a different network marketing income curve from a one-time-purchase product. MLM income statistics published in 2024 may overstate or understate what 2026 looks like for any given network. For founders building their first network, the [FlawlessMLM software platform](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/software) captures all three operational levers in configurable form. Starter kit, autoship rule, and rank ladder are configuration items, not custom code, which is why packages from $6,000 go live in one to two months instead of nine. Founders ready to [create an MLM company from scratch](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/create-mlm) typically reach a working pilot inside the same quarter they sign. ### Build the curve, not the deck. If you are scoping a new MLM company or restructuring an existing one, MLM income statistics belong in the planning phase, not the audit phase. A 30-minute consultation with our team covers MLM compensation plan logic, income disclosure statement structure, and the rank-distribution model you will be defending to regulators and MLM distributors two years from now. No obligation.  [Create Best MLM Software](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/contacts) --- Source: [FlawlessMLM Blog](https://flawlessmlm.com/en/blog/mlm-income-statistics)