3.3 million people pledged $529m on Kickstarter in 2014

"Kickstarter had its biggest year yet in 2014. The crowdfunding website saw more than 3.3 million people pledge $529 million to various projects over the course of the year, up from 3 million people pledging $480 million in 2013.
Like past years, 2014 brought a slew of highly memorable crowdfunding projects. The Coolest Cooler, a high-tech icebox that plays music in addition to storing drinks, earned $13.2 million in pledges last summer and became the most-funded project in Kickstarter history. In July, Levar Burton’s campaign to resurrect Reading Rainbow generated more than $5 million in pledges and became the first Kickstarter project to gain 100,000 backers.
Other highly successful projects included Neil Young’s high-fidelity digital music player Pono ($6.2 million in pledges), the Micro 3D printer ($3.4 million) and a pair of wireless earbuds that can store music and track your vital signs ($3.4 million).
Since Kickstarter only doles out money if projects reach their initial funding goals, that full $529 million wasn’t paid out to project starters. However, more than 22,000 projects were successfully funded in 2014, the most ever in a single year. Music was the most popular category for campaigns, with about 4,000 projects being successfully funded. However, technology attracted the most pledged dollars, as backers offered up $125 million to fund various gadgets."

Source:  Summary from Time, 5th January 2015

Full Kickstarter presentation here