Originally launched over 20 years ago, digital PC game storefront Steam is arguably one of the most well-known online gaming platforms and distributors worldwide. In 2023, Steam was estimated to sell over 400 million games in total.
How many players are on Steam?
After steadily increasing its user figures during the global coronavirus pandemic, Steam managed to retain its post-COVID momentum and continues to grow its active audiences. In 2023, the platform reported 33 million peak concurrent Steam users worldwide, an increase from 27.4 million just two years earlier. Additionally, the number of peak concurrent in-game users on Steam was estimated at over 10 million.
The most popular games on Steam
There are over 73 thousand games available on Steam, with over nine thousand games being published in the first nine months of 2023 alone. The biggest game on Steam in 2022 was Lost Ark. The free-to-play (F2P) MMO was ranked first in terms of peak concurrent users, topping out at over 1.3 million simultaneous players worldwide. Other popular titles of the year were the first-person shooter Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, as well as MOBA game Dota 2. Throughout the year, the most popular games regularly reach several hundred thousand concurrent players on average.
How does Steam make money?
Steam generates most of its revenue through digital game sales via its platform. While the PC gaming segment saw a brief but significant boost during the initial period of the COVID-19 outbreak, it was estimated that Steam’s annual gaming revenue in 2023 amounted to 8.56 billion U.S. dollars, down from more than 10 billion U.S. dollars in 2021. Platform sales account for over two-thirds of Steam’s gaming revenue, while in-game microtransactions make up the rest. Industry estimates place Steam’s average revenue per user (ARPU) at 19.55 U.S. dollars. Additionally, game developers must pay Steam a cut of their revenues in order to sell their products through the platform. The company has also branched out into producing gaming hardware, most notably the Steam Deck, a handheld gaming computer that was released in February 2022 to positive acclaim.
Steam’s continued market reach and impact
The company reported that in 2022, Steam drew approximately 83,000 new first-time purchasers every day of the year. Although Steam and its parent company Valve have stopped publishing public revenue figures for the platform, Steam still towers as an immensely influential digital storefront for online gaming purchases. A 2021 survey found that over a quarter of game developers worldwide generated 50 to 99 percent of their annual revenues via Steam.
Direct competitors of Steam include the Epic Games Store (operated by Epic Games), GOG.com (a subsidiary of video game company CD Projekt), British platform Green Man Gaming, indie platform Itch.io, the Humble Store, as well as publishers’ own first-party video game distribution platforms such as Electronic Arts’ EA App and the Ubisoft Store.
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