Steam reached a major milestone this weekend. The game portal registered more than 30 million concurrent users for the first time. At around 14:00 UTC today, 30,032,005 players were using the platform (opens in a new tab). Most will have taken advantage of some free time over the weekend to play their favorite PC games, but a large number would also be busy in the community, or browsing and purchasing more games through the storefront.
During weekends in 2022, concurrent Steam users generally peaked in the region of 27-29 million. The last highest concurrent user quota was at the end of March 2022, when 29,986,681 users were busy on the platform. However, as we all know, better weather in the northern hemisphere means people are getting out more over the weekend, leaving their gaming lairs or fortresses of solitude to gather dust. Night is starting to fall again, and with that, Steam’s concurrent user numbers have already surpassed 30 million milestones, before we even hit Halloween.
The PC platform is notable for several things, like its versatility, potential for massive CPU and GPU processing power, openness, and more. This latest Steam data, however, illustrates its durability in the face of better competition from consoles, mobiles and game streaming platforms. Additionally, there’s a lot of news about declining PC and component sales as the recession bites, but we see that PC gaming is probably stronger than ever.
Should the new Steam register PC and component companies? To some extent, yes, but we’ve seen PC enthusiasts and tinkerers who like to invest and upgrade some new builds because of price. In other words, PC and component makers can’t carry on as if there’s another crypto boom. Some may now enjoy selling flagship components at the top of the market, but many mainstream users will remain price sensitive.
Finally, congratulations to Steam, and we look forward to the next steps – maybe just after Christmas, then before the good weather returns in 2023.
