After Fortnite claiming the spot as the most streamed game on Twitch, Riot’s League of Legends has now bounced back to beat Fortnite with over 512 million hours watched on Twitch.
Without a doubt, Twitch is one of the biggest, if not the biggest, game streaming platforms in existence. Twitch plays an immensely vital role in the popularity of a game.
Whenever a Twitch influencer streams a game, it is seen by potentially millions of people all across the globe. This builds hype and that hype builds trends. This also boosts games sales. This is a big reason why game publishing companies want their games to be the most played game on Twitch.
According to data published by The Esports Observer on their website, in the first six months of 2019, Twitch audiences have watched over 512 million hours of Riot Games’ MOBA, League of Legends.
The Esports Observer has shown that League of Legend’s Twitch viewership has gradually increased from 435.2 million hours over the same period last year. It is also being estimated that League of Legends is likely to break one billion hours by the end of the year. The only game to ever do so was Epic Games’ Fortnite which was the most streamed game on Twitch back in 2018.
This is truly remarkable when you consider that League of Legends was released 10 years ago way back in 2009. In comparison, Fortnite was released around 2016. So for a 10-year-old game to score a comeback against a game as strong as Fortnite is very interesting. It is also worth noting that the League of Legends ban in Iran and Syria happened last month. This ban strangely didn’t affect League of Legends’ Twitch viewership as much as it was estimated.
On the other hand, Rockstar Games’ Grand Theft Auto V has also seen of the most substantial growth in terms of Twitch viewership. According to the data, GTA5’s Twitch viewership has increased from 58.8 million hours watched in H1 2018 to 269.1 million hours over the same period in 2019.
One of the biggest reasons for this sudden popularity of Grand Theft Auto V on Twitch is due to the introduction of roleplaying servers. Interestingly, GTA V also remained as the most-watched game on Twitch for a time period earlier this year.
We also have PlayerUnknown’s Battleground which has dropped out of the top ten entirely. PUBG previously had racked up over 232.2 million hours in Twitch viewership during the same period last year.
Apex Legends, which was one of the biggest Battle Royale trends in 2019, also broke streaming records on Twitch after its surprise launch in February. But February was a long time ago and since then, Apex Legends’ Twitch viewership has steadily dropped.
Apex Legends still remains strong though, with over 181.4 million hours viewed on Twitch. That is way more than Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Overwatch, and Hearthstone according to Esports Observer’s data.
It is likely we will continue to see substantial growth in League of Legends’ Twitch viewership primarily due to its upcoming release on mobile platforms with Tencent as the distributor.
