On August 3, Baldur's Gate 3, the highly anticipated CRPG from Larian Studios, was released worldwide. ince More than four years have passed since the game's announcement, so the hype surrounding the title was immense. As soon as Baldur's Gate 3 became available, users started streaming gameplay on Twitch to attract viewers with a first-hand experience.
Ranking of the most popular categories of Twitch on August 3
On the day of Baldur's Gate 3 release, its category on Twitch accumulated 3.7 million Hours Watched — surpassing all other games on the platform in this metric. Only Just Chatting ranked higher (with 8.2 million Hours Watched in 24 hours) if non-gaming categories are taken into account. Baldur's Gate 3 saw 156.5K Average Viewers, and 481.5K Peak Viewers. We should note that these statistics are not for an entire day, but from the actual game release time (4PM BST) until midnight.
On the first day of Baldur's Gate 3 streams, there were 5.3K different channels broadcasting the game simultaneously. The most popular channels were CohhCarnage and Fextralife — on August 3, they reached 65.6K and 36.8K Peak Viewers, respectively. Many streamers had giveaways of drops during their broadcasts — by watching for two hours, viewers could receive cosmetic clothing set for their characters, made in the platform's purple colors. This promotion will last until August 17.
As for the diversity of streaming languages, over 63% of Baldur's Gate 3 streams on release day were in English. The top 3 streams were in Russian and French, which accounted for 9% and 7% respectively.
Among the most popular Baldur's Gate 3 streamers were shroud, Quin69, sodapoppin, alanzoka, and other content creators. However, CohhCarnage emerged as the leader across three metrics: Peak Viewers, Average Viewers, and total Hours Watched. He also spent the most time on air among the top 10 streamers.
Comparison Of Baldur's Gate 3 With Other Titles
Baldur's Gate 3 rightfully belongs to the shortlist of the biggest releases of 2023, and in terms of popularity on Twitch, it can compete with other AAA titles. For example, the Diablo IV category accumulated 2.4 million HW on Twitch on its first day of early access, while Hogwarts Legacy had 3.8 million HW. However, it is important to understand that game releases often occur at different times of the day (typically in the evening), so a more complete statistic can only be seen on the second day when full 24-hour data becomes available. On the second day after its release, Diablo IV's Hours Watched number increased to 13.9 million, while Hogwarts Legacy reached 12.4 million HW. Let's see what numbers Baldur's Gate 3 shows for August 4.
Another important point is that the release of Baldur's Gate 3 happened all at once in one day, while Diablo IV and Hogwarts Legacy had multiple stages with early access for some users.
In the end, Hogwarts Legacy became the most popular single-player game in Twitch history, surpassing Cyberpunk 2077 and Elden Ring by Peak Viewers. As for Diablo IV, it became one of the most popular games in terms of total Hours Watched in 2022/23.
Baldur’s Gate 3 is not the first, but also not the last major gaming release of this year. We expect such high-profile releases as Starfield, Marvel's Spider-Man 2, Assassin's Creed Mirage, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2.
Read also:
- Dead Space remake fascinates viewers: game viewership skyrockets after its release;
- Hogwarts Legacy is booming on Twitch, the most popular single-player game in history;
- Dark and Darker in alpha test makes it to the Top 10 most popular games on Twitch;
- Diablo IV takes over Twitch post early access launch;
- Diablo IV doubles Hogwarts: Legacy viewership in its first-month on Twitch.
