Each month, PocketGamer.biz and Stream Hatchet break down the impact of mobile games and esports on streaming platforms; the ebb and flow of the most popular titles including Free Fire, PUBG Mobile, and Clash Royale, and pioneering newcomers; and how they’re reaching their audience.
The top ten most viewed games remain largely unchanged, with only one new entry compared to the previous month (Brawl Stars in tenth place). Mobile Legends: Bang Bang remains the most watched title, with 49.9 million hours of content viewed, representing a 1.6 percent increase from August. This was followed by PUBG Mobile at 37.1 million (a 17 percent month-on-month decrease) and Garena Free Fire at 31.3 million (a 12 percent decrease.)
In total, 176 million hours of mobile gaming streams were watched, an 11 percent decrease from August. YouTube Gaming remained the platform of choice for mobile content creators, accounting for 83.7 million hours viewed – 47.4 percent of the total. This represents a 1.4 percent month-on-month increase.
Facebook Gaming also saw a small increase in market share, rising from 41.6 percent to 42.1 percent month-on-month, with a total of 74.3 million hours. Twitch, meanwhile, saw a decline in hours viewed, reaching 18.5 million hours and 10.5 percent of the total viewership.
Esports saw a 31 percent year-on-year decrease in total hours viewed, with 40.6 million hours. Only three territories worldwide achieved more than a million hours viewed: Eastern Asia (20 million hours), Southeast Asia (14.2 million hours), and South Latin America (1.1 million hours).
Mobile Legends: Bang Bang’s MPL Indonesia Season 10 was the most successful esports event of the month, with a total of 13.9 million hours viewed and peak concurrent viewership of 1 million. Arena of Valor’s 2022 Arena of Glory Winter event was in second place, with 8.3 million total hours viewed and a peak CCV of 315 thousand. Meanwhile, MPL Malaysia Season 10 was the third biggest esports event of the month, with 5.8 million hours and 346 thousand peak CCV.
Despite only coming in third place in terms of total viewtime, Garena Free Fire was streamed on more unique channels than any other mobile game, with 70 thousand. 65 percent of these channels were on Twitch, followed by Facebook at 19 percent and YouTube at 5.6 percent. Of the top five mobile titles in terms of number of channels, Twitch is the dominant platform on all but one (Mobile Legends Bang Bang at 39 percent). This suggests that while Twitch sees the lowest share of viewtime, this is split among more content creators compared to other platforms.
