China's 5 richest people boast $258B combined net worth

1. Zhang Yiming – founder of tech firm ByteDance

Zhang Yiming, founder of ByteDance, speaks at a forum during the 2nd World Internet Conference in east China's Zhejiang province, Dec. 17, 2015. Photo by Imaginechina via AFP

Zhang Yiming, 41, launched ByteDance in a Beijing apartment less than a decade ago.

Now boasting over a billion users worldwide, the company also runs Douyin, the Chinese version of the platform designed for domestic users. It has transformed the way internet users engage with social media through its viral video-sharing app, TikTok.

Zhang’s net worth has climbed by more than $10 billion following Bloomberg’s assessment of valuations from several investors and ByteDance’s employee stock buyback initiative. This put the average valuation of ByteDance at $365 billion.

In January, TikTok faced a brief suspension in the U.S. but was reinstated in under a day. However, its fate in the U.S. remains in limbo as President Donald Trump has set an April 5 deadline for ByteDance to sell its U.S. operations, after which the app could face another potential ban.

Zhang has an estimated net worth of US$65.5 billion as of March 28, according to Forbes.

2. Zhong Shanshan – founder of bottled water producer Nongfu Spring

Zhong Shanshan, chairman of Nongfu Spring, delivers a speech at a press conference in Beijing, China, May 6, 2013. Photo by Oriental Image via Reuters

Zhong Shanshan’s rise to wealth is a classic rags-to-riches tale. Having dropped out of elementary school, he worked various jobs, including construction, journalism, and beverage sales, before establishing Nongfu Spring, now China’s leading bottled water company.

Besides that, he also has a stake in Beijing Wantai Biological Pharmacy Enterprise, a medical supplies firm producing diagnostic kits and vaccines.

Zhong, 70, held the title of China’s richest man for years until his company was hit with a boycott early last year when online nationalist critics accused Nongfu Spring of using Japanese-inspired packaging.

As competition in the bottled water industry intensified and online backlash mounted, Zhong’s net worth took an $8 billion hit.

At a public event last November, he criticized e-commerce giant PDD Holdings for enabling price wars that he claimed undermined Chinese brands.

He also called out ByteDance for failing to curb social media attacks on Nongfu and demanded an apology from its founder, Zhang, for the damage caused by ByteDance’s news platform Toutiao.

As of March 28, Zhong’s net worth was estimated at $54.1 billion.

3. Ma Huateng – CEO and chairman of internet firm Tencent Holdings

Pony Ma Huateng, chairman and CEO of Tencent Holdings. Photo by Reuters

Pony Ma Huateng, 53, is among China’s richest individuals thanks to his stake in Tencent, a multimedia conglomerate he co-founded in 1998.

The firm began its rise in 1999 with QQ, an online messaging platform that bore a strong resemblance to ICQ, one of the earliest messaging apps, as per the South China Morning Post.

Over the years, Ma expanded the company’s reach into online gaming, digital payments, and mobile applications. It released WeChat in 2011, which now boasts over a billion monthly users.

Beyond bringing him immense wealth, QQ also played a personal role in Ma’s life. The billionaire is said to have met his wife, Wang Danting, in a chat room on the platform.

Last year, Ma’s net worth surged by more than a third as Tencent continued to thrive.

His wealth stood at an estimated $53.8 billion as of March 28.

4. Colin Huang – founder of e-commerce firm PDD Holdings

Colin Huang, founder of the online group discounter Pinduoduo, speaks during the company's stock trading debut at the Nasdaq Stock Market in New York, during an event in Shanghai, China, July 26, 2018. Photo by Yin Liqin/CNS via Reuters

Colin Huang, 44, came from a working-class background, with parents employed in factories, and later landed an engineering role at Google by 2004, according to Business Insider.

His breakthrough came in 2015 when he launched Pinduoduo, an e-commerce platform that rapidly gained traction in China.

Rebranded as PDD Holdings in 2023, the company grew into one of the country’s largest e-commerce firms. It introduced the Temu online shopping platform to the global market in 2022, competing with Shein.

Although Huang stepped down as the firm’s chairman in 2021, he remains a major shareholder.

For a few weeks last August, he was China’s wealthiest individual before PDD’s stock price plunged nearly 29% later that month. The drop wiped $14 billion from his net worth, as reported by Fortune magazine.

Huang had an estimated $43.8 billion in wealth as of March 28.

5. Lei Jun – founder of smartphone and electronics brand Xiaomi

Lei Jun, chairman and CEO of Chinese electronics company Xiaomi, presents the new electric car Xiaomi SU7 model at a launch event in Beijing on March 28, 2024. Photo by AFP

Lei Jun, 55, founded Xiaomi in 2010 with several partners, became China’s fifth-richest billionaire earlier this year following a 250% surge in the company’s stock over the past 12 months.

The rally is partly fueled by Xiaomi’s growing presence in the smartphone market, where it has shifted toward higher-priced, more profitable models. Now the world’s third-largest smartphone maker by market share, the company has also benefited from investors’ enthusiasm for China’s tech sector, spurred by DeepSeek’s launch of its affordable AI model in January.

However, the biggest driver of Xiaomi’s stock surge is the optimism surrounding its electric vehicle business.

Despite intense competition and ongoing price wars in the market, the company is on track to meet Lei’s goal of delivering 300,000 EVs in 2025, a target he announced in January. Last year, Xiaomi delivered more than 135,000 cars.

Lei’s net worth stood at $40.8 billion as of March 28.