40% of the games released on Steam in 2025 didn't even recoup the $100 registration fee

The indie apocalypse continues.

Polish indie developer Artur Smiarowski, citing Gamalytic, shared analytics on the sales of games released on Steam over the past year.

As of 2025, 13,000 games have been published on the platform. By comparison, 18,000 products were launched over the entire previous year.

Of all the published titles, 8% managed to reach the $100,000 mark.

Meanwhile, 40% of games failed to recoup the $100 registration fee, which Steam refunds when a game generates $1,000 in revenue.

Also, compared to 2024, it is very noticeable that average playtime, project revenue, and — very significantly — total revenue across all projects have decreased this year.

As Artur noted, “We may have reached the peak of the golden indie rush last year.”