February saw clear audience favorites, both among independent content creators and brand-affiliated channels. Gaming showcases and esports drew significant attention, and streamers like the ever-energetic Darren “IShowSpeed” Watkins and a group of Indian Let's Players stood out as major crowd-pullers.
Lately, YouTube Gaming’s top rankings have featured streamers with unusually high audience numbers that don’t match their typical monthly averages. The ranking below excludes suspicious channels.
IShowSpeed dominated February’s rankings by a wide margin. His most popular content came from Match for Hope, an annual charity soccer event organized by the Qatari platform Q Life, where top football stars and leading content creators compete.
The 2025 edition was a massive success, attracting a significantly larger audience than last year’s. While IShowSpeed didn’t manage to find the net (as has been the case in these events so far), the tournament raised over $10 million for charity.
Read more: The Match for Hope 2025 broadcasts drew over 700,000 Peak Viewers
Among VTubers, Pekora, one of the most popular talents from the hololive agency and the industry at large, achieved the top result. In February, her collaboration with Houshou Marine, where they competed in a variety of games, was the highlight for fans.
The rest of the ranking was fairly competitive, with most streamers achieving similar viewership numbers. Notably, three gaming streamers from India made the list, primarily specializing in the hugely popular Battlegrounds Mobile India (a localized version of PUBG Mobile) and Minecraft. The top 10 also featured Alexandre "Gaules" Borba, who covered FURIA’s run at IEM Katowice 2025.
One of the standout moments in the ranking was the appearance of Ukrainian streamer Vitaly 'Arthas' Tsal, one of the most iconic figures in the Eastern European/CIS Dota 2 scene. Having stepped away from the game long ago, he made a surprise return (thanks to a $20,000 donation!) and drew over 112,000 concurrent viewers to his comeback stream.
Among company-owned channels, the top 3 were those streaming trailers for various showcases and game announcements. The clear leader was the Japanese Pokémon franchise channel (with the English-language channel also making the top 10), where several video game announcements were revealed during Pokémon Day. As of now, this is the most popular YouTube Gaming stream in early 2025.
Sony PlayStation’s State of Play showcase was a huge success, surpassing 2 million peak viewers for the first time, with about a quarter of that number coming from the company’s main channel. While there weren’t any major announcements (except for the Borderlands 4 teaser and a Metal Gear Solid 3 remake), the excitement was palpable, as it marked the first showcase of the series in 2025.
The official Brawl Stars channel secured the third spot, featuring the first game update announcements of 2025. The developers shared several exciting changes, including enhancements to the reward system for free-to-play players, a rework of the ranking mode, two new characters, gadget updates, and more.
Esports also experienced significant success. Two LCK channels (Korean and Vietnamese) ranked in the top, broadcasting the first tournament of the season. The Indonesian MPL channel also attracted a strong audience with the debut of the new season in the Philippine division, while the KRAFTON channel aired the regular season of the Battlegrounds Mobile India Series 2025.
The only channel not directly related to gaming that made it into the top 10 is KM PUNK, a channel focused on cricket. On February 23, it drew over 312,000 concurrent viewers during the highly anticipated 2025 ICC Champions Trophy match between Pakistan and India.
Read more: Why are livestreaming gains still slow despite cricket's growing global interest?
