Infographic: Steam video game market report

9/12/2023

Steam games market key points:

• There are over 71k games on Steam (as of 2023)
• Over 50% of all Steam games have never made more than $1000
• 58% of all Steam games have been released in the last 3 years (On average, 40 games were released per day this year)
• If we only consider games released in the last 3 years, 50% of them did not gross more than $500. That's less than $300 after Steam fees and taxes
• However, if we exclude completely free games that don't make any money, median revenue is closer to $700 
• If we try to exclude the super simple and cheap games by only looking at games priced at more than $5, the median is closer to $4000
• If we further exclude all games under $10, the median is $17k! Quite good!
• Top 5% still make more than $200k
• More than 70% of all games released in the recent years can be classified as 'hobby projects' that are not backed by any video game publisher
• The number of games that gross over $10k increases every year
• Over 55% of all Steam games are priced under $5. Furthermore, 77% are priced under $10, and only about 5% of all Steam games are priced above $20
• PC players prefer deep, complex games. That's why genres like 4X, management and survival-craft tend to do well

In conclusion, most Steam games don't earn substantial profits, but it's also remarkable how many actually do, as the Steam game market remains healthy and continues to grow.

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