Staggering! This Woman's Donations Reach US$26 Billion, Surpassing Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos's Lifetime Giving

The name MacKenzie Scott has captured the attention of the global philanthropy world. The novelist and former wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has reportedly given away a staggering amount of wealth, believed to surpass the lifetime donations made by both Bezos and Elon Musk.

Scott has donated approximately US$26 billion (around Rp 439.4 trillion at an estimated exchange rate of Rp 16,900 per US dollar), accumulated over the past seven years. This extraordinary sum of donations places Scott among the greatest philanthropists of all time.

According to data from Forbes and philanthropy trackers, Scott’s total donations since 2019 make her the third-largest philanthropist in history based on the absolute value of lifetime contributions. Only two figures in modern history are recorded as having donated more than her.

Scott’s charitable disbursements amounted to US$7.2 billion in 2025. This figure represents the largest annual donation in her philanthropic career and has driven her total contributions to surge significantly.

According to the Times of India, the amount donated by Scott even exceeds the lifetime donations of several of the world’s top billionaires, including Tesla and SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk, Google co-founder Larry Page, Oracle founder Larry Ellison, and her former husband Jeff Bezos.

In distributing her donations, Scott has chosen an approach that differs from many top-tier philanthropists. Rather than establishing a large foundation with lengthy selection processes, she relies on a team of advisers to identify organisations deemed worthy of receiving assistance.

She then distributes grants in large amounts with few restrictions on how the funds are used. Beneficiaries include organisations working in education, racial equality, public health, housing, food security, and community development.

Since declaring her intention in 2019 to give away the majority of her wealth, Scott has moved at a pace uncommon among the world’s billionaires. The total of US$26 billion she has distributed is described as one of the largest and fastest rates of philanthropic distribution in modern history.

Scott’s wealth originated from her divorce settlement with Jeff Bezos in 2019, when she received a portion of Amazon shares. She subsequently sold some of those shares to fund her charitable activities.