Miranda Cosgrove Made More Money From iCarly Than You Think
Miranda Cosgrove's iCarly paycheck was i-mpressive!
If network sitcoms like Big Bang Theory — which saw its main cast earning $1 million per episode (the famed Friends salary) by Season 8 — have shown us anything, it's that when things are good, they're good. And that was definitely the case for actor Cosgrove during the beloved iCarly's hay-day.
Following in the footsteps of Teen Nick successes like Drake and Josh and The Amanda Show, Dan Schneider's iCarly hit the small screen in 2007 and did big numbers. According to The Futon Critic, by 2009, it had become TV's highest-rated kids' show, raking in 7.6 million viewers in one week. Following Carly Shay (played by Cosgrove) and her web series-slinging pals Sam Puckett (Jennette McCurdy) and Freddie Benson (Nathan Kress), the series clearly had the laughs and wacky side characters (who could forget the iconic Gibby?) that teens wanted to see. Plus, Cosgrove was just a great lead. She'd come a long way from gratingly singing "Memory" in School of Rock!
Sadly, iCarly wrapped in 2012 because real-life Cosgrove wanted to go to college. But with the money she was making, she easily could have paid her way through, grad school and a Ph.D. too. With two seasons of iCarly hitting Netflix in 2021, per Newsweek, and a reboot series announced by Paramount+ for 2021 (minus McCurdy), let's bask in the sheer wonder that is Miranda Cosgrove's impressive iCarly paycheck.
Miranda Cosgrove's iCarly paycheck was seriously impressive
So what was Miranda Cosgrove's iCarly salary? According to the New York Post, by 2010, the actor was earning a whopping $180,000 per episode. That makes her the second-highest-paid child actor of all time, per INSIDER, right behind Two and a Half Men's Angus T. Jones, who was making $250,000 per episode at the same time. Wow! That easily nets her $1 million-plus per season. It's no wonder that, according to Celebrity Net Worth, she is worth $10 million today. In 2014, at the young age of 19, Cosgrove even purchased a house in Los Angeles, Calif. for $2.65 million, per the Daily News, that spanned 3,000 square feet.
That said, it hasn't been all smooth sailing for the once-huge star. In 2011, Cosgrove suffered a broken ankle in a bus accident in Illinois. She claimed the accident deeply impacted her career. As TMZ wrote, the crash, "derailed 25 booked concerts," which would have brought the burgeoning pop singer, "nearly $400,000." They added, "Miranda says she lost another $560K in future shows," as well as yet another $400,000 due to a dropped Neutrogena contract. The financial losses reportedly totaled $2.5 million. Since Cosgrove's biggest credit to date is still iCarly, it's safe to say that the crash may have actually impacted things. Though questionable career decisions like her failure-to-launch pop career and 2015 critical flop The Intruders didn't help.
Here's hoping the 2021 iCarly reboot helps Cosgrove regain her momentum!