Twitch streamer Tyler Blevins, known in the Twitch community as Ninja, has been consistently growing in popularity in the past months. The 26-year-old streamer’s channel has received an influx of viewers in recent months.
Ninja began streaming back before Twitch.tv was Twitch.tv. He was a professional Halo player at the time, spending his time competing in tournaments and streaming when he had time. Since then, the Twitch streamer has hit many streaming and life milestones. He’s gained over 40,000 subscribers on his Twitch channel, garnered over 60 million views on his channel and has 1.8 million followers at the time of writing. He also has over 1 million followers on twitter and Instagram and a whopping 5 million followers plus on YouTube! Wowza…..YES! The internet really rewards you for being a gamer indeed….and Instagram Ninja also got married to his long-time girlfriend in 2017.

Ninja got his start in gaming when he became a professional Halo 3 player. Afterward, he moved on to Halo: Reach and continued competing professionally within the Halo series. While Ninja did not win any individual tournaments for Halo: Reach, that is where he started to get recognized in the professional gaming scene. From there, he played Halo 4professionally and moved on with the series to Halo 2: Anniversary. Ninja is currently a member of the Luminosity Gaming team.
Read on to learn more about Tyler Blevins.

1. He Has Been a Partnered Streamer Since 2011

Though Ninja may now be known mostly for his successful Twitch streaming, that was not always the case. Before 2011, he was playing games competitively. According to a Forbes interview, Ninja has been making over $100 a day streaming since 2011.

Now, the Twitch Partner Program is a little different than it was then. Currently, the requirements to become a partnered Twitch streamer include streaming to an established and steadily growing audience at least 3 times a week. In the “Road to Partner” on Twitch, it states that, in order to get partnered, a streamer must have an average of at least 75 concurrent viewers.

Though Ninja has been partnered since 2011, his stream has become more popular recently. Due to a number of factors including a relatively recent switch in games and overall community building skills, Ninja is becoming one of the most popular streamers on Twitch. His channel is currently the 10th most-followed channel on Twitch.

2. Ninja Was a Professional Halo Player

Until recently, Ninja was a professional Halo player. He announcedon August 13, 2017 that he would not compete in the fall season of the Halo Championship Series Pro League, citing his recent marriage, exploring his career in streaming and dedicating himself to PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. 

Prior to the announcement, Ninja had been competing in Halo tournaments for nearly a decade. He began his professional gaming career when he attended the MLG Orlando 2009 as a member of Four of  a Kind. He went on to place in multiple tournaments as a member of different groups. His career began to thrive when he began playing Halo: Reach competitively.
When Halo: 4 reached the professional scene, Ninja saw his first win. At the end of 2012, Ninja took 1st place at The Halo 4 exhibition as a member of Warriors. He continued to compete in Halo 4 tournaments through 2013. Ninja’s most recent tournament was in 2016, where his team placed 4th in the X Games Aspen 2016 in a Halo 5 tournament.

3. He Played Fortnite with Drake and Travis Scott

In late 2017, Ninja switched from playing H1Z1 and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds to playing the popular battle-royale game Fortnite. The streamer has quickly become known as one of the best Fortnite players. The game is free-to-play and has reached peak popularity in recent weeks. On February 8, 2018, Fortnite passed PUBG with 3.4 million concurrent players.

Ninja uses a variety of tactics to fight through matches on Fortnite. Every match brings something new, as he uses a launchpad to sneak up on opponents, forces his final opponent into a trap at the end of a game or, more recently, dominating opponents with the impulse grenade. You can watch highlights of the use of the impulse grenade here.
Ninja has said that if Fortnite were to move into competitive e-sports, he may not compete because he’d like to focus on streaming instead of competing. He keeps up a 2-a-day streaming schedule, streaming once in the morning and once in the evening. He takes the 3 hours in the middle to spend time with his wife and dogs.
While Fortnite has definitely been kind to Ninja in terms of growth of his Twitch channel, it’s unlikely he could have foreseen himself playing with rap superstar Drake.
It all started when Drake followed Ninja on Instagram and about a week after on the night of March 14 the two teamed upin Fortnite. Later in the night Ninja was joined by rapper Travis Scott and Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster.

(Drake is a fan of pineapple pizza.)

4. He is Married to Jess Blevins

Ninja met Jess at a Focus Fire tournament in Lacrosse, Wisconsin. Jess is from Wisconsin and said she thought Ninja was very cute when she met him. He had a girlfriend at the time, so they did not start seeing each other immediately after the tournament. Instead, a few years later they reconnected.
The couple dated for a few years and publicly announced their engagement via Twitter in November 2016. They were married in August 2017.

Jess is also a partnered Twitch streamer. Her channel is Jghosty, and she does cooking streams and also streams video games like Stardew Valley and Dead by Daylight. She also streams Rock Band and other titles.

5. He Makes Over $500,000 a month 2018

While Ninja’s salary isn’t set and his net worth isn’t made readily available, it is possible to speculate the amount the streamer is making via his Twitch channel.
Twitch has an agreement with partnerswhere they receive a portion of the money made when people subscribe to their channels. For affiliated streamers, the split is 50/50, and that’s usually more for partnered streamers. Ninja earns at least $2.50 per subscription, but that number is probably closer to $3.00. With thousands of subscribers, Ninja now earns over $500,000 a month. That number does not include bit donations, other donations or different tiers of subscriptions, so the actual number is likely much higher.

Ninja believes in using some of his money to give back to the community. A recent stream was set up as a charity stream for suicide awareness. During the stream, Ninja’s community raised over $100,000 for charity. Ninja got emotional after the charity stream.
I love you guys. We’re gonna celebrate because this is one of the most amazing things I have done in my entire life. Yeah, I have the viewers and sh**, but you don’t understand, like I can have 100,000 viewers and if no one cared, and no one would donate for causes like this. You guys are amazing, you guys are amazing! Thank you so much! Thank you.
Just one day into March and Ninja has surpassed 80,000 subscriptions with seemingly no end in sight.

6. The Blevins Appeared on Family Feud

Before Ninja became famous for his viral Fortnite clips he actually appeared on Family Feud with his family.
This appearance was made in 2014 so while he wasn’t as famous as he is now, he was certainly on the way to becoming a household name. The episode aired on February 5, 2015 so it has been several years since the appearance but it’s still interesting to see.
You can either catch a rerun of the episode for the show below.

Source: heavy