The online gaming market is growing at a pace. According to PwC’s Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2022-26, the video game sector is set to continue its exponential growth, with the industry set to be worth an estimated $31 billion by 2026. The market stood at $203.12 billion at the end of 2020. This means that as we head into 2023, online gaming is more popular than ever.
One of the main driving forces behind the huge growth in the market is the ever-growing mobile game market. According to AppAnnie in their State of Mobile Gaming in 2022 report, there was a total of 230 billion mobile game downloads in 2021, up from 80 billion in 2020.
The same report reveals that players spent $170 billion on mobile games alone in 2021, spending an average of 4.8 hours per day playing mobile games in 2021. These figures are all up significantly on the previous year, showing the continuing growth in the market. Perhaps the most interesting and significant increase is the amount of time users are spending on mobile gaming each day. 4.8 hours shows a 30% growth from 2020 and represent ⅓ of daily waking hours.
Casual games have the biggest download share (78%). For core games, it’s 20% and for casino games, it’s 2%.
These are some big numbers that highlight the rapid growth in the mobile and online gaming market and China continues to be the biggest market when it comes to online gamers.
Find out more about the top ten games of the last 10 years in a recent post.
According to Accenture’s “Gaming: The next super platform” study, there are over 2.7 billion online gamers worldwide and China has the lion’s share of this, with 929 million online gamers in China (35%). The US is the second-largest market for players with 219 million (8%) followed by Japan with 75 million (3%) and the UK with 40 million (1%).
Another driving force for the growth in online gaming is the development of tight-knit communities of gamers. Whilst gamers may appear to spend a lot of time on their own, they have actually developed online communities that are actually helping to create a more social environment for gamers.
According to the Accenture study, video games are helping to create virtual bonds that span the world:
- 84% of gamers say that video games allow them to meet people who share common interests
- 80% of gamers believe that video games allow them to meet new people
- 77% of gamers find that video games help them stay in touch with their friends
Social gaming is a growing trend that is expected to grow as we move into 2023 and beyond, helping to further grow the online gaming market.
Online gaming trends for 2023 and beyond
With the increase in the number of social gamers and those people using their mobile phones as their main device for gaming, it’s perhaps no surprise to see some of the trends for 2023 and beyond in online gaming listed below. New technology is also a big driving force in the industry, and this is helping not only take online gaming to the next level, but it is also helping to provide more secure platforms for online gamers.
Gaming Events
A more social online gaming community is not only driving gaming events, but they are also helping to break down traditional gender and age walls. Online gaming events are for everyone and events like E-Sport competitions are attracting players of all ages, genders and nationalities. These huge global events are often live-streamed on platforms such as Twitch and are viewed by millions of people around the world.
On-Demand Gaming
Driven by the movement to cloud gaming development, on-demand gaming allows users to play any game wherever and whenever they want.
Your game is hosted, stored, and run on remote servers in one or more data centres with sufficient power to offer you the best possible gaming experience. Google Stadia and Shadow of Blade are two great examples of cloud gaming that allow you to play on your phone, tablet, laptop and other platforms depending on your subscription.
Virtual and Augmented Reality
Virtual reality and augmented reality are two ways of online gaming that are already well-established thanks to games including Pokemon GO, Harry Potter Wizards Unite and Jurassic World Alive.
Virtual reality headsets have helped to take this trend to the next level and Oculus, Vive and PlayStation Virtual Reality (PSVR) have all been around for five years or more.
It is a trend we can expect to continue into 2023 and beyond, allowing users to fully immerse themselves in their favourite games. The opportunity to create virtual experiences through applications has been a big shift in the gaming industry. Betway Casino, for example, will transport you to the tables of Las Vegas or Monte Carlo and their new casino app allows for real-time games with live dealers streamed in HD straight to your device.
Summary
The online gaming industry is one that is growing exponentially right now and it’s fascinating to see how big gaming software developers are embracing new technologies to improve the gaming experience for the millions of gamers around the world.
Hi! I’m Bryan, and I’m a passionate & expert writer with more than five years of experience. I have written about various topics such as product descriptions, travel, cryptocurrencies, and online gaming in my writing journey.
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