The 10 youngest female CEOs Who Became CEOs under 30

“Women and girls can do whatever they want. There is no limit to what we as women can accomplish.” – Michelle Obama

The rise of women in the workforce over the last hundred years has been big progress. Women had always supported their families, but the recognition of their work only happened during World War I and II, when they officially started working in jobs as the men were away fighting wars. This showed everyone that women could do all kinds of work just as well as men.

Then came the laws that were focused on helping women. In the 1960s, rules were placed in many parts of the world to stop employers from treating women unfairly because of their gender.

Advancement in technology made a big contribution to the rise of women in the workforce. Computers and the internet created various new opportunities that were perfect for women. With remote work becoming more common, it’s easier for women to balance work and family life.

Nowadays, you’ll find women working in all sorts of jobs, from doctors to engineers to CEOs. But even though things have gotten better, there are problems like women getting paid less compared to men for the same work, women being passed over for promotion, and other stereotypes that hold them back. But still, there are women who fought all these stereotypes and are now the CEOs.

It’s great that more women are working; and each day more could be done to make sure women have the same opportunities and respect as men in the workforce. Below, we have created a list of the 10 youngest female CEOs who are breaking the stereotype with their exceptional stories.

The 10 youngest female CEOs who became CEOs under 30

Polly Rodriguez
Whitney Wolfe Herd
Kendra Scott
Melanie Perkins
Lani Lazzari
Sara Blakely
Huda Kattan
Alexa von Tobel
Lauren Bush Lauren
Jessica Mah

The 10 youngest female CEOs

1. Polly Rodriguez

Polly Rodrigues is the first CEO on our list of the top 10 youngest female CEOs under 30. In her early 20s, she became the founder and CEO of her sexual wellness company, Unbound. After completing her graduation, she started working with Deloitte and was earning well, but she felt that she was missing out on something and wanted to work for a start-up. She eventually started a job with a start-up company, even though her salary was less than half of what she was previously making. She loved her new job; here she had more responsibilities on her plate and enjoyed making decisions. She worked there for two years, and eventually she realized she wanted to start her own company. She saw the opportunity in female sexual wellness after her radiation treatment. She is a cancer survivor who would google sexual wellness and realize the lack of opportunities available. That’s when she started Unbonded with her co-founder, Sarah Jayne, in December 2014.

2. Whitney Wolfe Herd

The next CEO on our list of the youngest female CEOs under 30 around the world is Whitney Wolfe. She is one of the most famous CEOs in the world for her dating app; she was the co-founder of Tinder but resigned in 2014. After resigning, she co-founded Bumble in 2015, a female-centric dating app, with her co-founder, Andrew Andreev. By 2019, Bumble had almost 5,000,000 users, and she became the CEO. Eventually, she resigned from her role as CEO of Bumble in 2024 to enter the role of executive chair. She has approximately a 19% ownership stake in the company. She also funded a UK-based dating app for gays called Chappy. She had achieved all this before turning 30. The 10 youngest female CEOs

3. Kendra Scott

Kendra Scott, the founder and CEO of Kendra Scott, a jewelry company, was just 28 and heavily pregnant when she started her jewelry business. She went from store to store to sell her jewelry. Due to the recession, she had to nearly close her company, but because of the order she received from Nordstrom, she managed to keep her company, Kendra Scott, alive. She opened her first store in 2010, and in the same year, she also started her e-commerce business. She is one of those CEOs who believes in empowering women by giving them opportunities in her company. Her company consists of 95% women. In 2021, she decided to step down as the CEO of Kendra Scott. She is also famous for her philanthropic work. She is one of the most famous CEOs under the age of the age of 30.

4. Melanie Perkins

Canva is a popular platform for creators. So how can we not include Melanie Perkins in our list of the youngest female CEOs? She is an Australian entrepreneur who is also the co-founder and CEO of Canva. She started her first business, Fusion Books, with her husband, Cliff Obrecht. It was a platform that helped the students design their own school yearbooks, which helped her create the online template editing platform Canva in 2013. She became a CEO in her early 20s, placing her rightfully on our list.

5. Lani Lazzari

The next-youngest female CEO on our list of female CEOs under 30 is Lani Lazzari. She founded her skin care company at the age of 11. Her company was also featured in Shark Tank and got an investment from Mark Cuban. She became a CEO when she was just a teenager. The idea behind starting her own skin care company was due to the fact that she suffered from eczema, and all the skincare products available catering to her skin were either too expensive or very full of chemicals. That’s when she got the idea of simple sugars. She is the youngest female CEO who became CEO under 30 on our list.

6. Sara Blakely

Sarah Blakely is the next on our list of the youngest female CEOs under 30. She founded Spanx in 2000. It is an American apparel company that predominantly focuses on the hosiery concept that would fit different sizes. She invested her savings of $5000 at the age of 20 in researching and developing the idea of hosiery. Initially, her mother, grandmother, and friends would help her do research on her products. She gained popularity when Oprah Winfrey named Spanx her favorite thing in 2000. She had also been featured in Forbes magazine as the youngest female billionaire in the world. She participated in the Rebelbillionaire reality television series, due to which she met Richard Branson, who helped her both on her entrepreneurial and philanthropic journey.

7. Huda Kattan

The next youngest CEO on our list of the youngest female CEOs under 30 to feature on our list is Huda Kattan. She is the founder and CEO of Huda Beauty. She started her journey as a YouTuber in 2010. By 2013, she had founded her own cosmetic brand and released her first product, false eyelashes, which were highly successful. Then she started adding other beauty products like eyeshadow palettes, lips, liner, highlighters, liquid lipstick, etc. She has also been featured in Forbes top 10 most powerful influencers as well as the top 25 most influential people on the internet by Times magazine. She became CEO at the age of 29. She is also featured in the BBC’s list of the top 100 women in 2023.

8. Alexa von Tobel

Alexa von Tobel is the next CEO on our list of the top 10 youngest female CEOs. She is the founder and CEO of LearnVest.com, a personal finance website, and she is also the author of Financial Fearless, which was published in December 2013. She founded LearnVest.com in 2009 in New York. Her company was featured in TechCrunch50 in 2018. Her company defunct and discontinued offering their financial planning services to customers.

9. Lauren Bush Lauren

At an early age, Lauren Bush Lauren became the co-founder and CEO of Feed Project, a company that sold accessories to combat hunger. She was initially a fashion model and a fashion designer. She is also the granddaughter of former US President George H.W. Bush and the niece of former US President George W. Bush. She was in her early 20s when she became the CEO, thus rightfully placing her on our list of CEOs under 30.

10. Jessica Mah

The final young woman to be featured on our list of the top 10 youngest female CEOs under 30 is Jessica Mah. She is the founder and CEO of InDinero, a company that provides accounting software to various small businesses and helps handle customer transactions worth more than $2 billion. She has also been featured in Forbes 30 under 30 as well as in Inc. magazines 30 under 30. She has also founded various other start-ups, like InternshipIN, Mahway, etc. She is one of the most affluent and youngest female CEOs in the tech industry.

The 10 youngest female CEOs

You must Read: