9 of the largest yachts owned by tech billionaires, ranked (2024)

Superyachts have become the go-to status symbol for the ultra wealthy, providing highly secluded leisure and networking sites. They are – even more so than property – the single most expensive asset you can own.

While many tech billionaires have bought yachts, the richest of the rich, like Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, have gone even bigger. Their boats are virtual palaces at sea, decked out with amenities like gyms, spas, pools, nightclubs and cinemas.

A look at these superyachts – broadly defined as over 80-feet-long, mostly custom-built, and often costing nine figures – offers a glimpse into how the 0.00001 per cent live. It’s something few others will ever get to experience. Even chartering a yacht of this size for a week typically costs upwards of US$1 million.

Here are nine of the largest yachts owned by tech billionaires.

9. Sergey Brin: Dragonfly

Length: 239ft

Google co-founder Sergey Brin has built a flotilla of yachts, boats and toys known as the “Fly Fleet.” Named after a once-secret Google product, the largest of Brin’s armada is the sleek Dragonfly, which boasts a cinema and a helipad. The huge vessel was built by the Australian shipyard Silver Yachts and can fit up to 18 guests and 16 crew members, according to SuperYacht Times.

Also in his fleet is the superyacht Butterfly, a mere 124ft long. Often moored in the Bay Area, her crew members spend their downtime kitesurfing and giving swimming lessons to local kids.

The rest of his marine line-up includes a smaller boat called Firefly, as well as jet skis, foilboards, dinghies, and kiteboards. It takes a team of 50 full-time employees to manage, steer and maintain the entire operation.

8. Laurene Powell Jobs: Venus

Length: 255ft

After spending years holidaying on Ellison’s yachts, Jobs wanted one for himself. He designed Venus with French starchitect and decorator Philippe Starck, and it’s estimated she was worth between €105 million and €120 million (US$114 million and US$130 million). Unfortunately, the Apple founder never saw his vision come to life.

Jobs and Starck began working together in 2007, the designer told Vanity Fair, and held monthly meetings over four years. Venus was delivered in 2012 to Jobs’ specification: six identical cabins, a design to ensure spaces of absolute silence, and the most up-to-date technology.

7. Larry Ellison: Musashi

Length: 288ft

He bought his current boat Musashi in 2011 for a reported US$160 million from custom-yacht giant Feadship. Reportedly named after a famous samurai warrior, the yacht has both Japanese and art deco-inspired design elements. She also boasts amenities including a lift, swimming pool, beauty salon, gym and basketball court, according to luxury yacht charter marketplace Yacht Charter Fleet.

Ellison is known for his extravagant spending – private islands, jets, a tennis tournament – and yachting is among his favourite and most expensive hobbies. He took up racing them in the 1990s and financed the America’s Cup-winning BMW Oracle Racing team.

6. Mark Zuckerberg: Launchpad

Length: 287ft

Earlier this year, the yacht world was rife with rumours that Zuckerberg had bought Launchpad, a 287-foot superyacht originally designed for a sanctioned Russian businessman.

The ship made her maiden voyage in March, going from Gibraltar to St Maarten and mooring in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

Little is known about her interior, but photos show a large swimming pool and helipad. Her price, too, has been kept under wraps, but is said to be nine figures. Zuckerberg shelled out US$30 million for a support vessel, the Wingman.

5. Charles Simonyi: Norn

Length: 295ft

Delivered in 2023, Norn is full of luxe features, including an outdoor cinema and a pool floor that lifts to become a light-up dance floor. It shares a militaristic style with Skat, which Simonyi sold in 2021.

Skat’s name is derived from the Danish word for treasure. It had a listing price of €56.5 million and was launched in 2002. (Other reports value it at €49.5 million.)

“The yacht is to be home away from my home in Seattle, and its style should match the style of the house, adapted for the practicalities of the sea,” Simonyi once said.

4. Jim Clark: Athena

Length: 295ft

Meanwhile, Netscape founder Jim Clark bought the massive sailing yacht Athena in 2004, also measuring at 295ft long like Simonyi’s Norn.

Athena has room for 10 guests and 21 crew members, and the only change Clark says he’d make in her design is converting the lower deck office into a children’s room, per Boat International.

The former Stanford professor has tried to sell it at various points – listing it for US$95 million in 2012, US$69 million in 2016, and US$59 million in 2017 – but it has yet to change hands.

3. Barry Diller: Eos

Length: 305ft

Barry Diller, the chairman of digital media company IAC, co-owns the megayacht Eos with his wife, fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg, who is immortalised on the yacht’s prow by a figurehead sculpture by Anh Duong, according to Harper’s Bazaar.

One of the largest private sailing yachts in the world, the three-masted Lürssen schooner measures 305ft long. She took three years to be built before being delivered to Diller in 2006 and, since then, little has come to light about her interior and features, though according to the specs on the website of boatbuilder Lürssen, Eos caters for up to 14 guests across seven cabins and features interiors by François Catroux. The boat has recently been given structural refit, as reported by industry publication Boat International.

The power couple has hosted many celebrities on the Eos, which spends its summers criss-crossing the Mediterranean and, last year, was in St Barts for New Year’s Eve. Over the years, guests have included Oprah Winfrey, Emma Thompson, Anderson Cooper and Jeff Bezos, leading some to believe she provided inspiration for his Koru.

2. Eric Schmidt: Whisper

Length: 312ft

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt made waves last year when he agreed to buy the Alfa Nero, the yacht of a sanctioned Russian oligarch, for US$67 million in an auction conducted by Antigua and Barbuda. But he backed out of the deal following legal issues over its true owner, according to Bloomberg. He quietly bought Kismet instead, per Yahoo News. The 312-foot-long Lürssen-built boat was formerly owned by the Jacksonville Jaguars’ billionaire owner Shahid Khan. Schmidt renamed her Whisper.

The ship, which can fit 12 guests and a crew of 28, features a master deck with a private jacuzzi, full-service spa, lap pool, cinema and outdoor fireplace.

While her final sale price was not public, she was listed for €149 million, and at a charity auction in January, one week aboard the ship went for US$2.4 million, according to industry outlet Yacht Charter Fleet.

1. Jeff Bezos: Koru

Length: 417ft

Amazon founder Bezos’ US$500 million megayacht, the 417-foot Koru, made a splash last year as it criss-crossed the Mediterranean in its first summer at sea, with its 246-foot support vessel Abeona in tow.

The sailing yacht, which is hard to miss thanks to its massive size and unique design, was host to Bezos and his fiancée Lauren Sánchez’s famous friends. The couple held an engagement party on board, which reportedly drew guests including Bill Gates, Ari Emanuel and Leonardo DiCaprio. Just a week later, they were reportedly seen on the streets of Dubrovnik, Croatia, with Orlando Bloom, Katy Perry and Usher.

Even before its completion, Koru made headlines. It drew the ire of some Dutch citizens, who vowed to hurl eggs after it was reportedly announced a historic bridge in Rotterdam might be taken apart to allow the Oceanco boat through. Luckily, the shipyard made alternative plans, and an egg crisis was averted.

Among yacht world insiders, Koru is widely praised for its craftsmanship.