In 2024, Twitch's viewing hours have remained relatively consistent, reaching a total of 18.9 billion hours
Twitch's total viewing hours have maintained a steady level, with 18.9 billion hours viewed in 2023, slightly up from 18.5 billion the previous year.
The State of the Stream 2024 report by StreamElements, sourced with help from Rainmaker.gg, attributes the stagnant growth to creators moving to different platforms or splitting their focus due to the rise of multistreaming to reach wider audiences.
Daily viewing hours in the fourth quarter were consistent with prior quarters, reflecting a dip from the second quarter that persisted through the year.
Remarkably, the top nine games on Twitch have stayed about the same over five years. Grand Theft Auto 5, League of Legends, and Valorant are the most played, occupying the first three spots. CSGO, Fortnite, Dota 2, Minecraft, World of Warcraft, and Call of Duty: Warzone complete the top ten list. However, "Just Chatting" remains Twitch's biggest category, featuring over twice the viewership of GTA 5, partly due to KaiCenat's notable streaming marathon.
Despite this, League of Legends viewership decreased by 34% in November, with GTA 5 and Dota 2 experiencing 10% and 7% declines, respectively. Conversely, World of Warcraft saw an 84% increase, and Fortnite rose by 38% in the same month.
StreamElements highlights KaiCenat as a dominant figure in both monthly and annual rankings, amassing 184 million hours viewed in the year—more than twice that of ibai, who is in second place. However, they point out the significant contributions of other creators like Jynxzi, Caudrel, caseoh_, and Papaplatte, who appeared in the annual top ten for the first time.
For a comprehensive analysis, see StreamElements' full report.
Or Perry, the CEO of StreamElements, commented, "Twitch has seen a rotation of leading streamers from Ninja, to xQc, and now KaiCenat." He noted that "diversifying platforms is key to staying relevant. Ninja has started multistreaming while xQc is exploring different platforms for varied content." He added, "It’s likely KaiCenat will also explore similar strategies as being present across multiple platforms is critical for growth, utilizing some for discovery and others for building communities. Multistreaming is expected to gain more traction in 2025, as the technology advances and becomes more accessible to content creators."