A new study has estimated the number of billionaires who have made the UAE their home. According to Altrata’s Billionaire Census 2026, a provider of global data on wealthy investors, there are over 52 billionaires with a combined fortune of $201 billion in 2025.
This makes the UAE among the world’s top 15 billionaire markets. The Emirate currently occupies the 14th position, while India occupies the fifth position with 132 billionaires with a combined wealth of $454 billion.
The UAE ranked behind Saudi Arabia, which had 59 billionaires with combined wealth of $175 billion. The UAE’s billionaire population accounted for about 1.4 per cent of the global total of 3,795 billionaires, while their combined wealth represented roughly 1.3 per cent of the global billionaire fortune of $15.1 trillion.
Interestingly, the UAE’s billionaire population fell 1.9 per cent year-on-year in 2025, while their combined wealth reached $201 billion. Despite this, the Emirate remains one of the prominent global centres for wealth, business and investment.
As for Dubai, the Emirate ranks eighth among cities worldwide by billionaire population, alongside Shenzhen. The Emirate was home to 43 billionaires in 2025, up from 41 a year earlier. Only New York, Hong Kong, San Francisco, London, Singapore, Los Angeles and Beijing ranked ahead of Dubai.
The Census also revealed that the global billionaire population last year recorded its strongest expansion since 2020, growing by 8.2% year over year to an all-time high of 3,795 individuals. Over the past decade, the billionaire class has increased by nearly 60%.
Total billionaire wealth rose by 12.8% to a record $15.1 trillion, equal to about a quarter of the total market capitalisation of the S&P 500 in 2025, Altrata said, attributing this to artificial intelligence investment.
"This year's Billionaire Census shows a billionaire class being reshaped by AI at a pace we haven't seen before, but the story doesn't end there," the firm's vice president of sales, Paul Sutton, said in a statement. "Wealth is concentrating faster at the very top."
