Steam smashes all-time concurrent player record with 30 million users

Steam Deck lending a hand(held)

PC gaming platform Steam has smashed its current all-time record for Most Current Players, with a staggering 30 million players plus jumping online over the course of this past weekend.

The numbers peaked on Sunday, October 23, with an amazing 30,032,005 players online.

While no one game, in particular, can be tipped as responsible for this player platoon, mass multiplayer titles — such as Electronic Arts’ Apex Legends, PUBG Corporation’s PUBG: Battlegrounds, and Valve’s own long-running Steam icons DOTA 2 and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) — remain the most popular and most played titles on the PC-based platform. In regards to sales, the most popular Steam purchases in recent weeks have been Activision’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Sega’s Football Manager 2023, and Paradox Interactive’s strategy sequel Victoria 3.

Gaming, or simply just hanging out, on Steam has seen consistent forward momentum since Valve launched the platform way back in the fall of 2003. This growth has accelerated since the COVID-19 pandemic and its aligned global lockdown legislation. More recently, the launch of the powerful handheld console, Steam Deck, has also seen more players remaining logged in and online for longer periods of time — whether gaming, chatting, or just idly ramping up their own electricity bill.

Steam hits new 30 million concurrent player peak [Steam]