First released in 2003 by Valve Corporation, Steam is one of the leading PC gaming platform for gamers across the world. Through releasing its first-party games and other offerings from third-party developers and publishers, it is estimated that Steam generated more than 10 billion U.S. dollars in revenues in 2021 when the PC gaming segment saw a boom during COVID-19. In 2023, this trend has normalized and Steam's annual gaming revenue (including platform sales and in-game microtransactions) amounted to 8.56 billion U.S. dollars.
Steam still going strong
Despite fierce competition from console rivals and the decline of game revenue, Steam still manages to hold on to a loyal legion of fans. In 2023, Steam reported 33 million peak concurrent players on its platform, up from 27.4 million peak concurrent players in 2021.
Steam’s biggest game
There are a staggering amount of games released each year on Steam, with over 10,600 alone arriving on the platform in 2022. These games can vary from classic shooter games to farming simulators, yet it is a very small fraction of the games that bring in the big bucks. The average price of a video game on Steam was 15.20 U.S. dollars in 2023.
