Diablo IV took the Twitch landscape by storm when it was released in early June. It made a grand entrance with a pre-release, followed by the full release on June 6th. This highly anticipated sequel, the first in over a decade, generated immense excitement leading up to its launch. The action RPG received a positive reception and dominated Twitch as the reigning king for its first month.
Explore the data for Diablo IV’s debut not only in isolation but in comparison to other global viewership metrics for newly released games within the last couple of years. Diablo IV has been successful, but can it compare to the titles of Elden Ring or Overwatch 2? The answer might surprise you, as Diablo IV received twice as much viewership in terms of Hours Watched compared to Hogwarts: Legacy.
Diablo IV’s first-month statistics broken down
Most watched games on Twitch per Hours Watched, June 2023
Diablo IV dominates Twitch games with 156M Hours Watched accumulated throughout the month, it achieved a 50M Hours Watched gap to second place, League of Legends. When it comes to Peak Viewers, Diablo IV came close to hitting seven figures, reaching a height of over 942,000 Peak Viewers. The runner-up VALORANT with 614,000 Peak Viewers wasn’t able to compete with Diablo IV, despite the surge of viewers due to the VCT Masters in Tokyo.
Diablo’s success wouldn’t be possible without star Twitch streamers. For example, Asmongold returned from a half-a-year streaming hiatus on the main channel to celebrate the Diablo IV release. Over 92K Peak Viewers tuned in to watch Zack’s return and he maintained an Average Viewers of 57K while streaming.
Shroud also almost dedicated the entire month of June exclusively to Diablo IV; the game made up over 97% of Airtime for shroud that month. Throughout over 250 hours of Airtime, he amassed 6.4M Hours Watched and reached 84K Peak Viewers. This makes Diablo IV shroud’s most popular game per Hours Watched this year, and his second-most-popular game per Peak Viewers this year, sitting behind Counter-Strike 2.
Diablo IV release compared to other newly released games
It’s no question that Diablo IV had one of the biggest viewerships of any game this month, but how does it compare to other titles?
With an impressive 150M Hours Watched, Diablo IV surpassed many beloved titles which were released in 2022 and first half of 2023. It outperformed the highly anticipated sequel to Overwatch and Hogwarts: Legacy, the long-awaited official Harry Potter game. To put Diablo IV's exceptional performance into perspective, its 150M Hours Watched surpasses the combined Hours Watched of Pokémon Scarlet/Violet, God of War Ragnarök, and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.
However, despite Diablo IV’s best efforts, Elden Ring claimed the top spot. Elden Ring, the first truly open-world game by FromSoftware Inc, collected 177M Hours Watched during the first 30 days. Considering the 909K Peak Viewers who tuned in on release day, it's no surprise that this open-world Dark Souls title continues to dominate Twitch viewership, even after being released for over a year.
First-month viewership statistics visualised
Taking a more detailed look at these first-month statistics, it is clear to see how the pre-release was beneficial to the reception of Diablo IV. Diablo IV and Hogwarts: Legacy both received similar initial viewership, however, Diablo’s prerelease allowed the full release of the game to give itself a huge boost to viewership. The boost’s effects were felt throughout the month, with viewership staying consistently ahead of Hogwarts: Legacy.
The difference in reception between games released as part of a yearly series and other titles is evident immediately. Games such as FIFA 23 and CoD: MW II are both part of ongoing series - FIFA and Call of Duty, respectively - that receive annual game releases. These games experience markedly less initial viewership, although they sometimes outperform other titles in the long run.
FIFA 23 received more Hours Watched throughout the month than Hogwarts: Legacy, despite the Harry Potter game receiving an initial 8M Hours Watched more than FIFA 23. By the end of the month, FIFA 23 was receiving anywhere between 1-2M Hours Watched per day, whereas Hogwarts: Legacy was only achieving 200K-300K Hours Watched. Interestingly, despite amassing 77M more Hours Watched than FIFA 23, Diablo IV’s Hours Watched per day were comparable to FIFA 23’s by the end of the first month.
Finally, turning to Overwatch 2, the Blizzard title managed to secure third place overall in first-month viewership and the Overwatch team completed this achievement through a smart release schedule. Similar to Diablo IV’s prerelease, Overwatch 2 was able to keep audiences and creators interested and engaged with Overwatch 2’s release through community interaction.
Through simply activating Twitch drops, Overwatch 2 was able to emulate the popularity boost of a prerelease through simple community engagement. Indeed, Overwatch 2’s boost by day five was even greater than Diablo IV’s, when compared to their first-day data. An additional Twitch drop was organised, but this paled in comparison to the effect of the Halloween event for the game.
After a month of Twitch domination, Diablo IV solidified itself as one of the most successful game releases on Twitch. Although not able to dethrone Elden Ring, over 150M Hours Watched in 30 days is a monumental achievement and Diablo IV’s influence on Twitch will surely continue for many years.
All this serves to highlight the unbelievable popularity of Elden Ring, which achieved its success without the use of Twitch Drops or other community engagement tactics. Keep up to date and informed about the latest trends on your favourite streaming platform with Streams Charts.