After a weak close to last year, Kick entered January 2026 with a clear rebound. The platform reversed its December decline and posted growth across every major metric, spanning both streaming supply and audience demand. More channels went live, more hours were broadcast, and viewers responded in kind, marking a broad-based recovery rather than a single-metric anomaly.
January also became the second consecutive month in which Kick set a new internal benchmark for content diversity. The number of distinct categories hosting live broadcasts reached an all-time high, reinforcing the idea that the platform’s activity is spreading beyond a narrow set of core formats and into a wider range of content verticals.
One outlier stood out within this expansion. Slots & Casino, traditionally one of Kick’s strongest and most defining segments, was the only major category to post a slight decline. Whether this signals the early stages of structural evolution in Kick’s content mix or simply a short-term fluctuation remains an open question, but it adds an interesting layer to an otherwise broadly positive month for the platform.
Every tracked metric posted growth in January, with increases ranging from 2% to 35%. Viewer-side indicators expanded slightly faster than streamer activity, suggesting that Kick’s recovery was driven primarily by renewed audience demand rather than a sharp increase in broadcast supply.
Content breadth continued to edge upward as well. The number of livestreaming categories grew by just 2%, the smallest increase across all indicators, yet it was still sufficient to push the platform to a new all-time high for content diversity.
The most pronounced change came at the top end of the funnel. Peak viewership surged by 35% month over month, with a significant share of over 2 million live viewers concentrated around a high-profile broadcast hosted by Luis "WestCOL" Álvarez. The stream, titled “Todo Tiene Una Explicación”, centered on a public, long-form conversation addressing past personal controversies and circulating rumors. Rather than a staged spectacle, the format focused on clarification and narrative closure, turning a single media moment into one of the largest drivers of Kick’s January peak viewership.
Genre dynamics in January remained broadly positive, but with a few notable exceptions. Of the top 10 genres on Kick, eight posted growth month over month. RPG activity effectively stalled, finishing the month flat, while the Gambling segment declined by 1%, making it the only major category to move into negative territory despite its continued structural importance for the platform.
The strongest relative growth came from the Racing genre, which expanded by 22%. This increase was driven in part by higher activity around titles such as Rocket League and Euro Truck Simulator 2, both of which saw elevated streaming presence during the month. At the opposite end of the spectrum, Survival recorded the sharpest decline among leading genres, also down 22%, marking the most pronounced contraction within Kick’s top content verticals in January.
Moving from genres to individual categories and games, the picture stays largely positive. Nearly every major title on Kick increased its viewership in January. The sharpest relative growth came from Dota 2, which surged by 68% alongside the start of the new esports season. EA Sports FC followed with a 52% increase, supported by higher activity from Middle Eastern creators, a region where the franchise continues to perform especially well.
Among the decliners, two cases stand out. Slots & Casino continued the mild downturn already noted earlier, while Counter-Strike dropped out of the top ten categories. The latter, however, is better explained by calendar effects than by waning interest. In December, Counter-Strike benefited from heavy coverage of the StarLadder Budapest Major, where Kick accounted for roughly 20% of the tournament’s total viewership. With that event concluded, January naturally saw a normalization rather than a structurally negative shift for the game on the platform.
The most-watched & most popular Kick streamers in January 2026
The January top list reflects a notably broad demographic spread, underscoring Kick’s multi-regional reach. Leading channels came from the Middle East, the United States, South America, Eastern Europe, and Japan, illustrating that audience concentration on the platform is not limited to a single language group or geographic cluster.
One channel stood apart with anomalously high results, while the rest of the top creators clustered within a relatively narrow band of roughly 3 to 9 million Hours Watched over the month. Within that group, only one English-language creator appeared in the top tier: Adin Ross. He also ranked second overall in terms of peak concurrent viewership, trailing only WestCOL. His January performance was driven primarily by fighting-related content, with a near-300,000 viewer peak reached during Brand Risk Promotions #12.
And finally, the female streamer ranking followed a familiar but slightly distorted pattern. The top spot once again went to Alondra “alondrissa” Michelle, who finished January with a substantial lead over the rest of the field. That gap, however, was driven less by sustained dominance and more by volume effects: she streamed only once during the month, a single three-hour broadcast, which sharply inflated her Average Viewers figure relative to creators with longer and more frequent schedules.
Beyond the top position, the list was largely shaped by Hispanic creators. Streamers from countries such as Peru, Chile, Colombia, and Puerto Rico made up the bulk of the top ten, reinforcing the region’s outsized role in Kick’s female creator ecosystem and its broader audience composition.
One notable exception within the ranking was emikukis, a VTuber who secured a place in the top ten. While virtual creators remain a niche presence on Kick compared to other platforms, her appearance hints at early experimentation and suggests that this content format may gradually gain traction on the platform over time.
