Marques Brownlee is a YouTube sensation. The tech-review prodigy has 1.8 million subscribers—more followers than Kanye West, Marvel, or Disney Animation. Under the username MKBHD, he tests everything from cameras and headphones to Google Glass and the latest Tesla. This summer he got his hands on a sapphire crystal display rumored to be for the iPhone 6. In the video, which has gotten about 8 million views, he took keys, his foot, and even a blade to the screen with no result. (Though a follow-up featuring comedian Joe Rogan wielding a crossbow proved it’s not indestructible.) The best part: This gadgetry powerhouse is a 20-year-old kid from New Jersey.
Brownlee started making review videos almost six years ago, though it’s only in the past few that he developed his affable persona and slick filming style. “If I’m going to give someone advice on what to buy, you want a personality to back it up rather than some robot telling you X is better than Y,” Brownlee says. Today, his channel generates enough money from ads “to pay for itself and to make it worth my time.”
Brownlee is currently balancing this one-man production with his senior year of college and—of course—playing professional Ultimate Frisbee for the New York Rumble. He wants to expand his universe of review subjects too. “Anything with an On button is fair game,” he says. Like most people his age, he’s not sure what he’ll do after graduation. We suggest media mogul.
