If you have ever doubted how much Steam means to the gaming market today, then today I have information for you. We all know that more and more games have been making it to the service. Love it or hate it, there are many games there that you can only find on Steam and most PC gamers have an account.
Still, you may be surprised to see the latest figures about exactly how much of the PC market Valve actually controls.
The Stats
According to Steam Spy, a service that keeps an eye on many different Steam statistics, the paid gaming market on Steam was worth an estimated $3.5 billion last year alone. Yes, I said that right.
That was billion. Shocked? I know I was. Yes I knew that Steam was becoming ever more dominate by the day but I had no idea just how much they have taken control of the PC gaming market.
Now this stat from Steam Spy doesn’t include figures directly from developers and it cannot account for games purchased elsewhere and then activated through Steam from those bought straight from the service itself.
While that means there is a large margin for error, even if they are a few hundreds of millions of dollars off, that figure still remains giant in the gaming world.
In 2019, 8290 games made their way onto Steam’s servers, up from just 1,771 from 2014. In 2017 Steam made $4.3 billion dollars of revenue through game sales. These numbers don’t include any in game transactions or free to play games that offer DLC for a small fee.
When you include all the figures, it works out that Valve controls approximately 15-20% of the global PC gaming market. That is no small feat.
What’s Next
Recently, the wave of games making their way to the service has slowed, but the service still continues to add new games every day to its collection. This, of course, is both good and bad.
While you can often find great deals on games and you have one central location to help you control your gaming collection, for many games you are forced to use their service and install their software whether you want to or not.
Many PC gamers aren’t necessarily happy with this setup, but for the time being at least it seems that all of us gamers are stuck with it.
Still, Valve offers a great and reliable service with their Steam client and the feature it includes are often welcome to many PC gamers.
The question becomes as they gain more power and control over the market, how will they wield it? That is a tough call to make, and for now it seems we must wait and see how everything plays out.
So what do you think about these figures? Are you happy for Valve’s success or does their growth worry you as they take control of the PC gaming market? Let me know in the comments below.
