The interest for e-sports and gaming is growing rapidly in Sweden. An increasing number of consumers are drawn to this type of online content. Almost 400,000 Swedes watch e-sports or gaming daily, making it considerably more popular than traditional sports online.
This is reported by Mediavision in the analysis E-sports & gaming 2016/2017.
“The extremely rapid consumer growth has also led to an interesting development among market actors. Both Twitter and Facebook have invested in this segment, a clear statement that e-sports is a future market for them. Major Nordic actors like MTG and Egmont are also increasing their activities in this market. It will be very interesting to see how this plays out,” said Torbjörn Axelsson, analyst at Mediavision.
In Sweden, online viewing of competitive and casual gaming has become very popular. Already in early fall 2016, Mediavision could report that e-sports surpassed traditional sports in daily online viewing. Now, Mediavision’s latest analysis shows that this development has not only continued, but accelerated. E-sports and gaming attracted on average 370,000 daily viewers in the fourth quarter of 2016. This is 35% more that the same period in 2015. Traditional sports reached considerably fewer, on average 280,000 daily online viewers.
Viewing is especially high in young target groups. More than 15% of 15-24 year olds watch e-sports or gaming an average day. However, Mediavision also sees a clear increase among older viewers.
The most popular channel is Youtube. This Google owned company and streaming giant, has grown and now reaches more e-sports and gaming viewers compared to the same period in 2015.
The launch of Youtube Gaming in August 2015, is a likely cause. The second most popular service is Twitch. Apart from Youtube and Twitch, there are few services that can compete when it comes to reach. However, as e-sport and gaming become more popular competition will most likely increase.
