Twitch has enjoyed an extremely successful start to 2024. Q1 of this year marked the first-ever quarter in Twitch’s history in which every month boasted over 5 million Active Channels, and in January, Twitch enjoyed its highest watch time in years: 1.923B Hours Watched. Moving into Q2, things have slowed down for Twitch, but viewership remains strong for one of the world’s major live-streaming platforms.
In March, Twitch’s viewership was boosted by international esports events for various gaming titles. For April, this esports viewership has calmed down, but other sectors and streamers have enjoyed increases in viewership. VTubers are rising within Twitch’s female streamers scene, and international creators from various countries climbed the rankings overall.
Compared to March, viewership for Twitch in April did mark a downturn. The platform generated 1.626B Hours Watched, a 10% decrease compared to March, and Average Viewers dropped by 5%. Whilst Q1 was a successful period for Twitch, these metrics are lower than expected for the platform. The Hours Watched metric for April is the lowest Twitch has seen since mid-2020, despite Average Channels remaining stable compared to last year.
In general, viewership for Twitch in April declined, despite the amount of channels broadcasting remaining roughly stable. The Peak Channels metric continues its steady downturn which began at the beginning of the year, but this follows Twitch setting a platform record for this metric in December of 2023.
Most Watched Games & Categories on Twitch, April 2024
As is becoming the norm, the top-end of the most-watched games and categories on Twitch remains static. Just Chatting leads the way with 232.27M Hours Watched, loosely followed by Grand Theft Auto V with 124.02M Hours Watched.
The next three games are the esports titans of Twitch: League of Legends, Valorant, and Counter-Strike. All of these disciplines held significant events during March, but Counter-Strike suffered the most from the lack of headliner events in April, dropping from 93M HW in March to 55.18M Hours Watched. Valorant saw the smallest decrease, with the viewership for the game staying strong even after the culmination of the international Masters Madrid event.
Call of Duty: Warzone was the first game on this ranking to increase its watch time compared to the previous month, although Rust enjoyed the largest increase in viewership. The title sprung up 26 spots compared to last month, and enjoyed a 233% increase in viewership. The 27.5M Hours Watched for the game stemmed from a server featuring several of Japan’s most popular streamers. Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Siege recorded a slight decrease in viewership, but still managed to gain a spot and appear in this top 10.
Most Watched Channels on Twitch, April 2024
Top Twitch channels of April 2024 by Hours Watched and Peak Viewers
Jynxzi took the top spot as the most watched creator on Twitch for April. The streamer enjoyed a slight 6% increase in viewership, and garnered 10.52M Hours Watched in total for the month. However, Japanese streamer fps_shaka enjoyed a significant 36% increase to his watch time and jumped up 8 places compared to March. His most popular content for the month were his Rust streams, which allowed him to collaborate with other creators and reach an even larger Japanese audience.
KaiCenat and Gaules both recorded a decrease in viewership compared to March. Gaules covered the PGL Major Copenhagen 2024 in March, the first-ever CS2 Major event and the first Major of 2024. His viewership for March was astronomical thanks to his coverage of this event, and he was naturally unable to replicate this in April, where no significant international Counter-Strike LAN events took place.
Eliasn97 and Papaplatte of Germany both sprung up the rankings this month; the former was enabled by Streamingwoche 2024, a week of special streams hosted on his Twitch channel. He recorded a 49% increase to his viewership, the most of any streamer in this ranking, and finished the month with 6.58M Hours Watched.
Caseoh_ was the final streamer on this ranking to record an increase in viewership and climb up the rankings. The American streamer filled April with short, punchy streams that garnered high average viewership. Compared to other streamers who saturate months with lengthy streams and high broadcasting time, caseoh_’s concise approach to content paid dividends. Despite recording the shortest Airtime of any streamer in this ranking, he enjoyed 6.57M Hours Watched.
Ibai, 加藤純一です, and Baiano represented three different corners of Twitch: Spanish-speaking, Japanese, and Brazilian, respectively. Despite the high viewership for these creators, they all received fewer Hours Watched in April compared to March, and resultantly, slipped down the rankings slightly.
In terms of Peak Viewers, the LCK reigned supreme. The Korean League of Legends league remains as one of Twitch’s most popular destinations, and the channel received 206K Peak Viewers for the final match of the Spring split between Gen.G and T1. Another side of gaming, Bungie received 150K Peak Viewers for their showcase of the upcoming The Final Shape content package for Destiny 2, rather than esports coverage as with the LCK.
BALLERLEAGUE and kingsleague both received significant viewership, representing the mix of live streaming culture and real-life sports events. The former represents the German live streaming sector, whereas kingsleague appeals to Spanish speakers. Both leagues were among Twitch’s most popular channels for the month, highlighting the potential this format has for live streaming.
Most Watched Streamers on Twitch, April 2024
Usually, we separate Twitch channels, which can include organizations, from regular streamers. However, as the most watched channels graphic above does not include any organizations, this section only deals with peak viewership.
The top three of this graphic are all familiar faces, Jynxzi reigned supreme under another metric, and KaiCenat and ibai both followed closely behind. League of Legends creator Caedrel enjoyed 140K Peak Viewers thanks to his coverage of the LCK grand final. Impressively, the English community caster was only 66K concurrent viewers behind the official Korean LCK channel, which usually is a step ahead of other channels involved with the league.
MontanaBlack88 of Germany reached 121K Peak Viewers thanks to a collaborative unboxing stream with other creators, enjoying a boost in viewership thanks to these other creators present. Auronplay and k4sen also both achieved their peak viewerships thanks to collaborative content. Auronplay reached 104K PV with a GTA role playing server, and k4sen reached 99K PV thanks to the aforementioned Japanese Rust server featuring various streamers.
Tarik, Valorant’s most popular community caster, reached 107K Peak Viewers covering the Valorant Champions Tour Americas league. The match between his own organization, Sentinels, and 100 Thieves was the cause of this peak. Although tarik’s own popularity was a large cause for this viewership, the stream was boosted by 100 Thieves founder and CEO Nadeshot, who participated in tarik’s watch party of the match.
Most Watched Female Streamers on Twitch, April 2024
Top Female Twitch streamers of April 2024 by Hours Watched and Peak Viewers
On the female side of Twitch, VTubers led the way this month. Ironmouse was the most watched female streamer of the month with 1.53M Hours Watched. The Puerto Rican streamer retained her top spot, despite receiving 30% fewer HW this month: a testament to the strength and dominance of her channel.
However, independent Japanese VTuber 赤見かるび (akamikarubi) was close behind ironmouse, and is catching up. The Japanese streamer’s channel began to grow exponentially in mid-2023, and her strong viewership has continued all this time. She received 58% more Hours Watched this month than in March, and finished April with just 1.7K fewer HW than ironmouse. If this growth continues, she will soon be Twitch’s most watched female creator by a significant margin.
Mira once again enjoyed high watch time thanks to her over 680 hours of broadcasting time during the month. Alongside Taiwanese VTuber 烟花蹦蹦蹦 (hennie2001), Spanish streamer IJenz, and newcomer ibabyrainbow, these streamers all recorded significant watch time thanks to broadcasting on their channel nearly throughout the entire month 24/7. Ibabyrainbow in particular was the most successful of these four, recording a 280% increase to her watch time and jumping up 90 spots in the ranking compared to March. The streamer boosted her viewership with the help of a subathon, which took place throughout the first half of the month.
Kyedae ranked fourth this month, slipping down two places and recording a 17% decrease to her watch time. The Canadian streamers decrease in viewership is largely due to March’s Masters Madrid Valorant event. Throughout the event, she supported her fiancé TenZ, a professional Valorant player and streamer, and March was her most watched month on Twitch ever. Despite no international Valorant events in April, she nevertheless managed to record high watch time and collect 1.28M Hours Watched.
Jinnytty and rivers_gg also fell down the rankings due to decreases in watch time. Jinny streamed her regular IRL content through April, and rivers_gg garnered the most watch time thanks to her coverage of the Queens League, where her team PIO FC competes.
In terms of peak viewership, Moroccan streamer cameliaaa92 was the lead female streamer for April. She received 57K Peak Viewers for a pajama party collab stream with other creators, which was her second-most-popular broadcast on Twitch ever.
Emiru was the queen of North American Twitch for April. The OTK co-owner was Twitch’s most popular female streamer thanks to a collaborative cosplay stream with fellow creators pokimane, AriaSaki, and hyoon. The collective of female creators cosplayed Valorant agents, and it became Emiru’s second-most-popular stream of 2024.
Recently debuted VShojo VTuber MichiMochievee received 44K Peak Viewers for her debut stream on Twitch. Although her viewership has not come close to this peak since her debut, this is proof of the power of VTuber agencies. The VShojo name was enough to earn Michi tens of thousands of concurrent viewers, and she has since settled into an average viewership of thousands of fans.
Pokimane garnered 33K PV while IRL streamer from Maya’s animal sanctuary; Maya herself earned 23K PV thanks to raid from PirateSoftware while IRL streaming: the high seas sailor raided her channel with 34.3K viewers of his own.
QTCinderella received 30K PV during the finale of her Master Baker special live stream series. The stream featured some of North America’s favourite creators, and the appearances of these personalities helped boost her channel to the top of Twitch. Fellow North American ExtraEmily garnered 24K PV thanks to a collaborative IRL stream alongside Fuslie, and finally, across the world, Japanese VTuber 橘ひなの (hinanotachiba7) earned 26K PV thanks to the ever popular Japanese Rust server.
