Nigel Farage Net Worth: The UK’s Richest Politician

Nigel Farage is a British politician and media personality. He started his career as a commodities trader but moved into politics in the late 1990s.

Farage is a Member of Parliament (MP) and the leader of Reform UK, a right-wing political party.  He also led the Brexit Party from 2019 to 2021.

Nigel Farage has an estimated net worth of $4 million in 2025.

Nigel Farage bio

Nigel Farage net worth

Farage made most of his wealth from his career as a commodities trader, political activities, and media jobs. He started trading commodities after leaving school and worked for various brokerage firms. 

Farage, in his more than two decades of political career, has held several crucial roles, including leading UKIP twice, and leading the Brexit Party from 2019 to 2021. He also represented South East England as a Member of the European Parliament from 1999 until the UK left the EU in 2020. He is currently a member of parliament for the Reform UK party, which is a significant contributor to his wealth.

Farage also hosted his own talk radio show for about three years, and has worked for many media outlets. Farage’s 2018 financial records reveal that he earned about $1 million from media activities.

In 2024, Farage appeared on British reality TV show, I’m a Celebrity Get me Out of Here. He is the highest paid contestant in the show’s history, earning £1.5 million for his involvement.

Early life, education and career

Farage was born on April 3, 1964, in Farnborough, England, to Barbara and Guy Justus Oscar Farage. Farage’s father was reportedly an alcoholic who left the family when Nigel was just five years of age.

Farage initially attended Greenhayes School for Boys in West Wickham, and then moved to a similar school in Eden Park. He then attended Dulwich College in south London from 1975 to 1982.

Farage started his career as a commodities trader at the London Metal Exchange in the 1980s. He initially worked for the American arm of Drexel Burnham Lambert, but later moved to Crédit Lyonnais Rouse. He has also worked for Refco and Natixis Metals.

Farage was active in the Conservative Party from his school days, especially after the visit of Keith Joseph, a British politician, to his school. In 1978, he joined the Conservative Party.

Talking about his personal life, Farage married Irish nurse Gráinne Hayes in 1988 and had two sons. However, the couple divorced in 1997. In 1999, Farage married German national Kirsten Mehr. The pair had two children but separated in early 2017.

Farage’s political rise

In 1978, Farage joined the Conservative Party, but voted for the Green Party in 1989. In 1992, he left the Conservative Party over Prime Minister John Major’s signing of the Treaty on European Union (EU).

Farage was a founding member of UKIP (UK Independence Party) in 1992. In 1999, he was elected to the European Parliament as a representative from South East England, and was re-elected again in 2004, 2009, and 2014. Throughout his time in the Parliament, he advocated for the UK’s exit from the EU.

Farage was elected leader of UKIP twice, from 2006 to 2009 and from 2010 to 2016. During the 2009 European elections, UKIP grabbed the second-largest share of the UK vote. In 2013, he steered UKIP to its best-ever performance, winning 147 council seats.

UKIP won 24 seats in the 2014 European elections, beating both Labour and the Conservatives. However, in the 2015 general election, UKIP secured just one seat. Thereafter, Farage played an important role in the successful Brexit campaign during the 2016 EU membership referendum.

Farage quit the UKIP leadership role after the Brexit vote, but stayed as an MEP until he left the party in late 2018. He then played a crucial role in establishing the Brexit Party, and became its leader in 2019. He led the party to a record 29-seat win in the European Parliament elections.

After the UK officially left the EU in early 2020, Farage renamed the party Reform UK, shifting focus to anti-lockdown efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic. In March 2021, Farage stepped down as the party’s leader but continues to reshape British politics as a member of parliament for the Reform Party.

Farage has also been active internationally, supporting far-right leaders like Austria’s Norbert Hofer, France’s Marine Le Pen, and Germany’s Beatrix von Storch. He also supported Donald Trump and met him after the 2016 presidential election.

Farage’s broadcasting career

On the day of Trump’s presidential inauguration in 2017, Fox News hired Farage as a political commentator for Fox News and Fox Business Network.

In the same year, Farage started hosting The Nigel Farage Show on the UK talk radio station, LBC. On his show, Farage interviewed several high-profile guests, including President Donald Trump, on the day the UK was set to leave the European Union.

For a few months in 2018, Farage hosted the show under a new name, Farage Against The Machine, a tongue-in-cheek reference to legendary rock act Rage Against the Machine. The podcast was cancelled after the band made serious objections to the name.

In June 2020, Farage left the radio station LBC, and a year later, joined the British news channel GB News. Farage hosts a Sunday morning political discussion show at GB News and a weekday evening program.

Awards and achievements

• Honored with the Lifetime Achievement for his role in the 2016 Brexit referendum by the political magazine The Spectator
• Shortlisted for Time magazine’s Person of the Year award in 2016
• Presented with an honorary doctorate of laws degree during Liberty University’s weekly convocation in 2020
• Won the award for Best Presenter at the annual TRIC Awards in 2023

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