Steam reached a new high in concurrent players on January 11th, hitting 42,042,778 – surpassing 42 million players for the first time. The platform has been steadily growing in popularity, and record-breaking player numbers are becoming increasingly common.
Steam has been a popular platform for over two decades, but it’s become even more widely used recently, particularly since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic six years ago. The number of people using Steam at the same time has more than doubled compared to before the pandemic, and its growth is happening faster than ever.
A recent analysis by Wccftech reveals that Steam experienced significant growth in recent years. Before the pandemic, Steam grew by about 4.5% annually. However, lockdowns in 2020 caused a surge in growth, reaching 31.5%. Since then, growth has stabilized to around 13% per year. Wccftech also notes that Steam had record-high revenue in December 2025, likely boosted by popular new games like Arc Raiders and the indie success Peak.
Steam remains the leading gaming platform, despite growth from Epic Games Store, which has attracted users with free games but hasn’t matched that success with revenue. While Roblox briefly surpassed Steam in peak concurrent players – reaching a record 47.3 million in August thanks to a popular in-game event – Steam generally has a higher average number of players online. Currently, Roblox averages under 20 million concurrent players, according to RoMonitor.
Valve is preparing to release new hardware, like an updated Steam Machine and the Steam Frame VR headset, suggesting Steam will continue to expand and thrive for the foreseeable future.
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2026-01-13 16:11