Late on July 10, Kai Cenat added yet another feather to a burgeoning career milestone cap when he entered the top five most followed Twitch streamers list. He did so by overtaking platform darling xQc, who readers must remember now splits his live broadcasting time with Kick, having signed a lucrative deal with the company in June 2023.
At the time of writing, the 22-year-old has 12 060 830 followers on the purple platform, sneaking ahead of xQc's mark of 12 002 990 followers. The leader of this pack, by a considerable distance, continued to be Ninja, whose follower count of 19 065 584 speaks volumes of his popularity among viewers as he gradually inches towards the unprecedented 20,000,000 mark.
Getting back to Kai Cenat, he was a literal unknown until the start of 2023 before rising to prominence at the beginning of that year with his subathon, dubbed 'the mafiathon,' which helped him break the platform record and become the first-ever influencer to hit 300K subscribers, ending the month-long entire exercise with 306,518 subs. Having beaten the mark of legendary content creator Ludwig, the American became an instant megastar in the business, a wave of momentum he has continued to ride to this day.
Such has been his surge in popularity that the AMP member now attracts a caliber of guests and fellow streamers to his live streams that few in the North American scene can. This includes celebrities like Kevin Hart, Nicki Minaj, 21 Savage, Offset, and Lil Baby, with their involvements helping many of these broadcasts some of his most successful ever.
Initially not known for his gaming prowess, he has also worked hard to change that aspect of his streaming career. This can be seen in his regular Rainbow Six Siege broadcasts with Jynxzi and, more recently, his Elden Ring playthroughs.
In fact, his 100+ hour streams of this FromSoftware game have played a major part in its renaissance on the Amazon-owned service, with the action role-playing offering jumping to the top of the charts in terms of watch time and peak concurrent viewership. That he has grown to the extent that he can legitimately affect the audience dynamics of games and segments is no mean feat and speaks to his dedication and following among online users the world over.
Having broken into an elite club of Twitch streamers with the highest followers, many fans are rooting for him to go after Ninja and break his record. However, before that, Kai will have to contend with a whole different challenge in the form of three Spanish creators who stand between him and his countryman.
This trio is not just any group of influencers but includes three of the biggest names in the Hispanic, and global, scene: Auronplay, Ibai, and Rubius. They enjoy between 15M and 16.3M followers, so it won't be easy matching them, let alone surpassing them.
However, if anyone can pull it off, it is a certain streamer who has risen from the Bronx to become a world-beater. And if he continues to put in numbers as he did with the Kevin Hart and Elden Ring streams, it won't be too long before Ninja starts looking over his shoulder every time he goes to bed.
