StreamElements has launched its October 2022 State of the Stream report. Along with an outline of the market, StreamElements additionally lined the month’s prime streamers and video games.

Submit-pandemic regular

In keeping with information companion Rainmaker.gg, livestreaming platforms — notably Twitch — are settling into a brand new post-pandemic regular.

Whereas month-to-month hours watched in 2022 follows related seasonal patterns to 2021, the month-to-month totals are down year-on-year. For Twitch, the brand new month-to-month baseline seems to be about 1.7 billion-plus hours watched. In October 2021, this benchmark was roughly 1.9 billion hours watched monthly.

The pandemic was a watershed second for livestreaming, introducing tens of millions of recent viewers to Twitch, YouTube, Fb Gaming and extra. A drop from pandemic period highs are to be anticipated as restrictions are lifted, however it was unclear simply how massive this drop off could be.

Total, the trade continues to be wildly outperforming pre-pandemic figures. Earlier than Covid-19, Rainmaker.gg reported that Twitch averaged 1 billion month-to-month hours watched — a acquire of 70%.

Gil Hirsch, CEO and cofounder of StreamElements added, “Twitch has reached an fascinating level the place we’ve a transparent baseline for 2022 that represents a large viewers whereas development has simmered past it. That is seemingly much less about livestreaming dropping momentum and extra about creators diversifying the place they’re creating content material, particularly as we see their growth to TikTok and the collective development of livestreaming.”

Gaules leads streamers

StreamElements reviews that Gaules was essentially the most watched streamer on Twitch in October 2022. The Brazilian creator co-streamed a number of esports occasions for Counter-Strike: International Offensive — primarily ESL’s IEM Street to Rio. Gaules has turn out to be a central hub for Portuguese-speaking viewers, making him a dependable companion for esports occasion organizers that wish to enhance general occasion viewership.

Equally, Nix benefited from co-streaming esports. The Russian Dota 2 professional offered his personal commentary and perspective on The Worldwide, the sport’s most necessary occasion. Nix streams much less persistently than the opposite streamers listed however TI reliably boosts his viewership.

Lastly, StreamElements highlighted the gender disparity in Twitch’s prime streamers. Amouranth was the one lady among the many prime 100 most watched creators on the platform in October 2022. High feminine creators, Fuslie and LilyPichu, have left the platform in latest months. Equally, Pokimane has been streaming fewer hours after a break in August.

Overwatch 2 has sturdy debut

Overwatch 2 introduced in 133 million hours watched on Twitch throughout October. It was the third most watched class on Twitch and the second hottest sport after League of Legends. The most recent Blizzard launch is just one of 4 new titles acquire sufficient hours to achieve a the highest 10 for a month. This was additionally adequate to beat its predecessor’s peak at No. 5.

A number of elements are driving this viewership, however two stand out. One is the the Overwatch League, which held main playoff-relevant match matches in October. One other is xQc, who primarily streamed Overwatch 2 in October. As some of the standard streamers on the platform and a former Overwatch League professional, xQc was capable of convey extra visibility to the sport.

Nevertheless, it’s unclear how a lot of this viewership was resulting from natural curiosity versus drops. Throughout launch, Blizzard rewarded Overwatch 2 viewers with in-game gadgets together with a legendary pores and skin in the event that they watched livestreams for a number of hours. This apply is frequent for esports occasions and sport launches to generate buzz and incentivize viewership,

Esports did play a serious position in different sport’s viewership in October 2022 too. Dota 2’s hours watched grew 76% resulting from The Worldwide. In the meantime League of Legends grew 41% as October hosted the qualifying levels for Worlds 2022.