All It Takes Is $10,000 Invested in Each of These 3 High-Yield Dividend Stocks to Generate Over $1,650 in Yearly Dividends

Do you need more investment income than your portfolio is currently giving you? The recent rise in interest rates certainly puts bonds on more investors' radars. If you're going to need this income to at least have a shot at keeping up with inflation, however, dividend stocks arguably remain the smarter bet.

With that as the backdrop, here's a closer look at three high-yielding dividend stocks that could generate over $1,600 worth of annual dividend income with just $10,000 stakes in each one.

PepsiCo

It's been an unusually disappointing past three years for patient PepsiCo (NASDAQ: PEP) shareholders. The beverage company's stock is now down 30% from its mid-2023 peak and back within sight of the multiyear low made around the middle of last year.

Blame the economic backdrop, mostly. Inflation has not only worked against PepsiCo by raising its production costs but has forced shoppers into becoming more cost conscious as well. PepsiCo's product lineup has also lost some of its marketing mojo as consumers rekindle their interest in healthier snacking. It's all been taking a toll on the company's bottom line.

Or was, anyway. Last quarter's organic revenue growth of 2.4% doesn't seem like much, but it's quite a bit for a consumer staples name that had been struggling and is still in the midst of an overhaul that includes the recent debut of new products like a prebiotic cola and a protein-infused version of its popular Doritos brand of snack chips. The company expects comparable revenue growth for the remainder of the year to be outpaced by per-share earnings growth of between 4% and 6%. Again, for the industry, not bad.

The irony? Despite the stock's sizable pullback, neither the company nor the stock's dividend was ever -- and still isn't -- facing an existential crisis. The stock's 54-year streak of annual dividend increases isn't at any real risk of being broken anytime soon either. In fact, PepsiCo has earned the title of Dividend King thanks to this record of annual dividend increases for over 50 years. The 30% pullback from 2023's peak has merely pumped the ticker's forward-looking dividend yield up to a multidecade high of 4.3%, That spells opportunity for anyone who can see the bigger, longer-term picture.

Altria Group

There will come a time when the tobacco business finally collapses. That time is much further down the road than most smoking-cessation advocates might care to admit though. According to data from the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention, about one out of every ten Americans still smokes, and that last 10% is proving to be a tough proverbial nut to crack. In the meantime (despite its own risks), vaping usage continues to rise, particularly among young adults.

The point is, there's still good money to be made within this sliver of the "vice" business, and there will be for a long while.

Enter Altria Group (NYSE: MO), although you may better know it by its brands like Philip Morris and Marlboro, or perhaps to a lesser extent, vaping brand NJOY or nicotine pouch maker Helix Innovations. While the company sold about 3% fewer cigarettes during the first half of 2026 than it did in the first half of 2025, net revenue continues to edge higher thanks to a combination of continued pricing power and sales of non-tobacco products. Arguably most important -- largely thanks to stock repurchases -- adjusted per-share profits improved by 2.8% in the second quarter of this year and are higher to the tune of 4.9% year to date. This of course supports continued payment of its dividends.

Image source: Getty Images.

Again, there's no denying the end of Altria's business as we currently know it is coming. The company's "moving beyond smoking" slogan explicitly concedes as much.

Its underlying dividend behind the stock's forward-looking yield of 6.5% isn't in any immediate jeopardy, and the eventual wind-down of its current operation won't suddenly happen. Investors should be able to see well ahead of time when the business is reaching the tipping point of sustainability. Enjoy its sizable dividend payments until then.

Verizon Communications

Finally, add Verizon Communications (NYSE: VZ) to your list of dividend stocks to buy for good dividend income. At its forward-looking yield of 5.7%, a $10,000 position would produce $570 worth of annual dividend payments.

You know the company. Verizon is, of course, the country's biggest wireless telecom service provider. As of June, nearly 147 million mobile devices were connected to its network, plus a few hundred-thousand wireless broadband subscribers.

It's not a high-growth business by any stretch of the imagination. The U.S. mobile market is highly saturated and highly competitive. Any real revenue growth will come from population growth and price increases, neither of which is a major growth driver.

What Verizon lacks in raw growth firepower, however, it more than makes up for in reliable cash flow.

Think about it. Good or bad, most Americans have made their smartphones a centerpiece of their existence. A recent survey from Reviews.org reveals the average person living in the United States spends over four hours per day looking at their smartphone's screen, topping their total connected television view time of just under three hours. With the well-developed habit now firmly in place, it's not a question of whether consumers will continue paying to keep their mobile devices connected. It's just a question of which provider they'll choose. And Verizon is doing pretty well in that regard too, adding 184,00 (net) postpaid phone customers in Q2 of this year, accelerating Q1's count of 55,000 despite market saturation.

What this effectively means for Verizon shareholders is dependable, continued dividend growth, extending the company's current track record of 20 consecutive years of annual dividend increases.

James Brumley has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Verizon Communications. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.