It seems like there’s little that can stop the momentum of Steam, as Valve’s PC gaming platform has been knocking down records left and right recently. Most notably, according to SteamDB, the platform finally surpassed 10 million players in-game, reaching a peak of 10,082,055 on Saturday. That record was then immediately broken on Sunday when peak players reached 10,284,568.
But wait, haven’t we heard about Steam racking up even bigger numbers in in the past? You’re probably thinking about the 30-million milestone broken back in October, but that was for concurrent users. That stat measures anybody who happens to have the Steam client open, whether they’re playing something or not. Still a decent measure of engagement with the platform (Steam surpassed 33 million concurrent users this weekend) but not an accurate accounting of how many people are actually playing games at the moment. The record we’re talking about now measures people actively playing games.
10 million+ players is an impressive stat, and more milestones are likely to be broken soon enough. While Steam has faced some challenges in recent years from competitors like the Epic Games Store and big publishers opting to focus on their own PC launchers, Valve seems to have largely won the day. Epic is established, but not exactly taking over the world, and publishers like Ubisoft are returning to the platform. In the end, Steam’s technological head start, and the undying loyalty of its customers, have proven to be too much for anybody to effectively challenge.
Steam recently wrapped up its holiday Winter Sale. The usual Lunar New Year Sale won’t be happening this year, instead replaced by a Spring Sale taking place a bit later in the year. How has your Steam experience been lately? What are the recent games you’ve picked up? Did you contribute to Steam breaking player records this past weekend?
