Participation in Steam game festival boosts wishlisting rate by 421%

Last summer, Valve held its first Next Fest, which offered playable demos to Steam users. The company decided to share some stats ahead of this year’s edition of the festival to show how these online events impact wishlisting and sales rates.

Key stats

• Daily wishlist additions among the 2020 Next Fest participants increased by 421% on average, compared to the two weeks prior to the event. Half of the developers saw an even higher jump, while only 5% saw a decrease in the wishlist rate.
• People continued to add games from the participants to wishlists even after the festival ended. Each title experienced a 15% increase on average during the three weeks following the event, compared to the daily wishlist numbers two weeks before.
• Sales of participating games released after the Next Fest jumped by 292% on average.

Valve has already held four demo festivals, and the new one will take place from October 1 to 7. Developers can register through August 16.

It is worth noting that wishlists don’t always convert into sales. According to Simon Carless, the sudden boosts during the festivals don’t guarantee that your game will generate a lot of money at launch.