This week, Stream Hatchet analyzed the rapid growth of mobile gaming on western streaming platforms in 2020. The mobile gaming market is booming globally but taking smaller steps in North America. With that being said, titles like PUBG Mobile and Garena Free Fire are still generating impressive viewership on YouTube Gaming and Facebook Gaming due to the more global nature of those platforms compared to Twitch. The mobile gaming market may finally get significant traction in 2021 as live streaming has become more mainstream and infused with pop culture.
- In 2020, mobile gaming increased 98% in total hours watched jumping from 164M in January to 326M in December.
- PUBG Mobile and Garena Free Fire were both among the top five most watched games of the year reaching 1.36B and 1.19B hours watched respectively.
- A large factor in mobile game growth is the accessibility and free-to-play nature of many popular titles which appeals to the global audience which may not have the infrastructure to support console or PC gaming.
