LOS ANGELES — With the conclusion of Season 34 of “Dancing with the Stars” on the horizon, recent reports shed light on the earnings of dancers for the final episodes.

Although precise salary details for DWTS participants, including professional dancers, troupe members, and hosts, remain undisclosed, some insights into their earnings have come to light.

According to a 2019 report by Variety, contestants earn $125,000 during the show’s rehearsal phase, which can involve up to 35 hours of practice each week, as per past contestants. This amount also covers their first two weeks of live performances.

Bobby Bones, who emerged victorious in Season 27 back in 2018, shared insights into his earnings on Jason Tartick’s “Trading Secrets” podcast episode released in September.

“That show pays okay,” Bones said. “Like first episode, no money, second episode, $10,000. I think it’s like, $10,000, $10,000, $20,000. It ends up being $50,000 an episode, if you last. So I ended up making like close to $400,000 from that show. So financially, pretty good.”

Essentially, pay is increased for every additional two weeks they last throughout the season.

Variety’s reported sources told them that a contestant can’t make more than $295,000. But DWTS season 29 winner Kaitlyn Bristowe, who was on “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette,” said there were signing bonuses the celebrity contestants could negotiate ahead of joining the show.

“The final four in the final episode all get the paid the same, but your signing bonus I think you can negotiate a bit, like to sign to say you’re going on the show,” she said in an episode of “Trading Secrets.”

Though the pay is much higher than the median American’s annual income, which the United States Census said was $67,027.24 in 2024, Bones said he earned so much more than what he was paid thanks to future deals that came from being on the show. 

“What I was able to do and get from that was so much greater than the money they were paying me,” he said in the podcast. 

Cosmopolitan reported longtime host Tom Bergeron would earn $150,000 per episode, or roughly $1 million a season, before he exited the show. 

The professional dancers paired with celebrities get paid roughly $1,200 per week when they start and pay increases up $5,000 the longer they stay on, according to US Weekly. A pro could make between $50,000 to $75,000 a season, depending on how many weeks they made it. There are typically 11 episodes per season. 

Troupe dancers, professionals who dance without a celebrity, get paid roughly half what the professionals dancing with celebrities do, former pro Lindsay Arnold said in a “Trading Secrets” episode. She was a pro in Season 16, the youngest in the show’s history, but was bumped down to troupe, saying she took a “total pay cut.” 

In the podcast episode, she said doing one season a year in troupe probably wasn’t enough to live off. She eventually returned as a pro in Season 22 and won Season 25 with when she was paired with Jordan Fisher. 

“I guess it depends on the kind of life that you live, but living in L.A., paying rent, buying food there, paying for gas, like, you’d be really tight,” she said.