who is the longest running contestant on jeopardy
Kenneth Wayne Jennings III
title: Jeopardy! text: of the Decades. The highest-earning all-time "Jeopardy!" contestant is Brad Rutter, who has won a cumulative total of $4,355,102. He became an undefeated champion in 2000 and later won an unprecedented four "Jeopardy!" tournaments: the 2001 Tournament of Champions, the 2002 Million Dollar Masters Tournament, the 2005 Ultimate Tournament of Champions, and the 2014 Battle of the Decades. Rutter broke Jennings's record for all-time game show winnings when he defeated Jennings and Jerome Vered in the Ultimate Tournament of Champions finals. Jennings regained the record through appearances on various other game shows, culminating in an appearance on "Are You Smarter title: Sports Jeopardy! text: same format followed by "Jeopardy!", in which they could compete indefinitely unless beaten; a tie between two or three players with at least 1 point would result in a sudden-death answer playoff, in a pre-determined category. This was to allow the show to be seen as more easily binge-watched. Under the returning champions format, four contestants won 5 consecutive games, including 15 day champion Vinny Varadarajan, 8 day champion Earl Holland, 6 day champion Eric Park, and 5 day champion Roy Hollis, with no tournament or final announced on-air for top winning contestants as of the most recent episodes. In title: Jeopardy! broadcast information text: gone on to win sixteen Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Game/Audience Participation Show, achieving this honor most recently in 2017, and today it holds the record as the most honored program in this Emmy award category. The show was the subject of great interest and increased ratings (often out-performing "Wheel" and even prime time programs) in the early portions of the 2004–05 season as contestant Ken Jennings, taking advantage of newly relaxed appearance rules, won 74 matches before being defeated by Nancy Zerg in his 75th appearance. He amassed $2,520,700 over the course of his winning streak as well as title: Jeopardy! text: than risk losing the money they had already won. From 1984 to 2002, non-winning contestants on the Trebek version received vacation packages and merchandise, which were donated by manufacturers as promotional consideration. The current cash consolation prize is provided by Geico. The winner of each episode returns to compete against two new contestants on the next episode. Originally, a contestant who won five consecutive days retired undefeated and was guaranteed a spot in the Tournament of Champions; the five-day limit was eliminated at the beginning of season 20 on September 8, 2003. Since November 2014, ties for first place following title: Jeopardy! text: Jeopardy! Jeopardy! is an American television game show created by Merv Griffin. The show features a quiz competition in which contestants are presented with general knowledge clues in the form of answers, and must phrase their responses in the form of questions. The original daytime version debuted on NBC on March 30, 1964, and aired until January 3, 1975. A weekly nighttime syndicated edition aired from September 1974 to September 1975, and a revival, "The All-New Jeopardy!", ran on NBC from October 1978 to March 1979. The current version, a daily syndicated show produced by Sony Pictures Television, premiered on