It’s been a little while since we checked in on the esports market, but y’know who’s checking in regularly on professional gaming tournaments? Gen-Z, that’s who.
At least, that’s a key finding from a report published by two big esports companies, ESL FaceIt Group (EFG) and Hero Esports, working with research firm Niko Partners.
The key stat is 400 million. That’s the global Gen-Z audience for esports according to the report, making this the biggest demographic by far in the 640m total audience.
That means around 20% of Gen-Z are regularly watching esports events and gaming livestreams, with the report noting that this audience is getting more diverse: 31.7% of Gen-Z esports fans are now women, up from around 20% for the overall market five years ago.
The report offers some useful data on the most popular esports games, a list topped by League of Legends with its peak viewership of 6.8 million people – and this excludes the huge audience on Chinese platforms.
YouTube is still the biggest global platform for esports viewing, 81.8% of people surveyed use it for this purpose. However, one surprise is that TikTok is second, used by 56.6%, some distance ahead of Twitch (37.4%).
Also interesting from a Music Ally perspective: music is the top non-gaming interest for Gen-Z esports fans: 47.5% list it as a top interest, while 53% pay for a music subscription.
That’s a crossover that one of the companies behind the report, Hero Esports, is already leaning into. It’s the partner with dance brand Tomorrowland on Shanghai festival The Magic of Tomorrowland, whose second event has just been announced.
