It’s difficult to get your finger on accurate and precise numbers when dealing with the gaming industry. They’re held very close to the chest of developers and publishers, and for good reason; they ultimately only result in domino effects to the detriment of the company.
It might work best as a thought experiment; let’s say that World of Warcraft loses 1,000 subscriptions for the month of January. The loss could be anything; they’ve played through all available content and are pausing the sub while they wait, new passions, whatever. Blizzard then takes that data and announces it, and suddenly thousands of articles pop up all over the internet with exaggerated headlines that all seem to shout the same thing’ WOW IS DYING!’
In the long run, it wouldn’t even matter if it was a standard drop in subscriptions that they see year after year, it would have a detrimental effect that would echo for quite some time. So excuse people for keeping mum on the numbers.
Luckily for us, there are market analysts that are very good at their job, and they aggregate all of the numbers in an easily digestible form for us to look through. Newzoo collaborated with Streamlabs to explain precisely where the lines in the sand were drawn when it comes to streaming platforms. It isn’t even close unless you take Twitch out of the equation entirely.
Want to know what happened across 2019's game-#streaming ecosystem?
Our recent article with @Streamlabs dives deep into the 2019’s streaming market, featuring data for #Twitch, #YouTube, #Mixer, and #Facebook.
Read the article: https://t.co/deGe7tglJT pic.twitter.com/bMvoZMO4k8
— Newzoo (@NewzooHQ) January 27, 2020
Newzoo reports that Twitch had 9.8 billion hours watched in 2019, compared to YouTube Gaming Live at 2.9 billion. Last came Mixer at 357 million hours watched. Twitch is almost tripling YouTube Gaming Live, although Newzoo reports that Twitch growth has fallen in 2019. In hours streamed by platform, Twitch comes out ahead yet again: 359.8 million hours streamed, and Mixer was second with 80.3 million. YouTube Gaming Live was at 48.2 million.
This actually tells us a good chunk of news; YouTube Gaming Live has fewer streams occurring than both Twitch and Mixer while maintaining a solid second place in most hours watched. If you’re looking at getting into streaming right now, YouTube bizarrely seems like the best plausible fit in terms of getting your voice heard (and making that sweet streamer money).
It almost seems counter-intuitive with how much drama YouTube has been causing with their own YouTube stars, and the living streaming service they offer. TO the point that your entire Google account can now be canceled if you’re not making them enough money, with little forewarning.
Perhaps it’s their recent exhibition of authoritarian strength that is keeping streamers away from YouTube Gaming Live. You’d be hard-pressed to find a streamer that wants their subscribers to all have their accounts deleted by Google.
You’d also be hard-pressed to find a larger waiting audience.
