The global live streaming market has surpassed 9 billion quarterly hours watched for the first time in nearly four years, according to Stream Hatchet’s “Q2 2025 Live-Streaming Trends Report.” The market recorded 9.1 billion hours watched in Q2 2025, representing a 5% year-over-year increase and crossing the 9 billion threshold for the first time since Q3 2021.
Platform Competition
While Twitch maintains its market leadership with 54.2% share, the platform recorded its lowest quarterly figure of hours watched since Q3 2020, falling below 5 billion hours (4.9B) for the first time in nearly five years. This marks Twitch’s fourth consecutive quarterly decline in hours watched.
YouTube Gaming achieved a milestone during the quarter, registering its highest-ever quarterly viewership with 2.2 billion hours watched, though its market share decreased slightly by 1% to 24.3%.
Kick continues its strong growth trajectory, improving its market share by 5.5% compared to Q2 2024 and approaching the 1 billion quarterly hours watched milestone with 983 million hours in Q2. The platform has doubled its non-gaming viewership year-over-year to 378 million hours.
“The success of alternative platforms such as Kick (+113% YoY) and Chzzk (+37%) continues to drive up viewership across all platforms combined,” notes the report.
Korean streaming platform Chzzk logged its third consecutive quarter with over 200 million hours watched, securing 2.7% of market share. The platform is benefiting from Twitch’s ban in South Korea, implemented in Q1 2024.
Smaller platforms showed remarkable growth, with KakaoTV registering an extraordinary 436,000% year-over-year growth from just 3,000 hours watched in Q2 2024. Indian platforms Loco (+44,000%) and Russian platform VK (+15,000%) also continued their resurgence.
Creator Migration
The migration of top streamers to alternative platforms is reshaping viewership distribution. The report identifies ten creators who recorded over 1 million hours watched on Kick in Q2 2025 despite having no viewership on the platform in Q2 2024.
Most notable is Zackrawrr’s high-profile move to Kick in June 2025, which helped him claim the title of most-watched creator in Q2 2025 with 28.6 million hours watched. His decision to simulcast on Kick gained him an additional 2.1 million hours watched and increased his overall viewership by 130% year-over-year.
However, results vary among streamers making platform shifts. While Zackrawrr benefited from simulcasting, Brazilian creator Baiano saw an 18% decline in total hours watched over the same period despite moving to Kick.
E-sports Viewership
E-sports viewership increased by 6% year-over-year to 729 million hours watched, the highest Q2 figure since 2023. This growth comes despite a 37% reduction in the number of tournaments (404 vs. 637 in Q2 2024).
The report highlights the increasing concentration of viewership, with the top three most-watched tournaments—2025 BLAST.tv Austin Major, LCK Rounds 1-2 2025, and MPL Indonesia Season 15—comprising 35% of the total hours watched, compared to just 22% for the top three events in Q2 2024.
Co-streaming continues to gain prominence in esports viewership. In Q1 2025, overall co-streamer viewership surpassed official esports channel viewership for the first time. While official channels grew 30% quarter-over-quarter in Q2, co-streamers still managed to claim an equal share of quarterly hours watched at 363 million.
“The number of co-streaming channels that achieved higher than 50K peak viewers in Q2 2025 was 35% higher than the previous year (50 channels vs. 37), while the number of official channels achieving that milestone fell 17%, from 76 to 63,” the report states.
Game Popularity and New Releases
“Grand Theft Auto V” reclaimed the top position in quarterly live streaming rankings for the first time since Q2 2024 with 515 million hours watched, an 18% quarter-over-quarter increase. The game’s Kick viewership alone increased by 67% compared to Q1 2025.
“Call of Duty: Warzone” rose six positions with a 104% increase in viewership following the well-received reintroduction of the “Verdansk” map. “Mobile Legends: Bang Bang” viewership increased 53% quarter-over-quarter, bolstered by MPL Indonesia Season 15, which contributed 75 million hours watched.
Among new releases, “Elden Ring Nightreign,” was the most-watched title in Q2 2025 with 41.6 million hours watched in its first 30 days. On its first day, it reached 7.7 million hours watched, a figure which over the last two years is second only to “Monster Hunter Wilds” and “Call of Duty Black Ops: 6.”
“Mario Kart World” and “Clair Obscur: Expedition 33” both garnered over 30 million hours of viewership. An interesting case is “Peak,” the co-op climbing game, which recorded only 83,000 hours watched in its first 24 hours but reached over 27 million hours in the first 30 days, with the number of unique channels streaming it increasing nearly tenfold from 29,000 after one week to 308,000 after a month.
Gaming Events and High Engagement
The Nintendo Switch 2 launch announcement on April 2 was the standout live-streaming event of the quarter, with a peak of 3.3 million concurrent viewers on Nintendo’s official Japanese YouTube channel. The Nintendo of America YouTube Gaming channel recorded a peak of 1.4 million viewers for the same event.
Summer Game Fest featured the highest chat activity among gaming showcase events in Q2 2025, with 98,300 messages posted across all Twitch channels during the minute the “Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds” trailer started, eclipsing the 69,000 messages posted at the moment of the “Resident Evil 9” reveal at the same event.
The surprise reveal of “Call of Duty: Black Ops 7” at the Xbox Showcase sparked 45,800 messages, while Nintendo Direct’s Switch 2 release date announcement and the “Marvel Tokon Fighting Souls” trailer generated similar levels of engagement with 38,000 chat messages.
Content Categories and Streaming Genres
Non-gaming content continues to cement its position as the most-watched live-streaming category with 1.59 billion hours watched, a 28% increase year-over-year. This growth is primarily driven by Kick, which has doubled its non-gaming viewership year-over-year.
Shooter games moved into the top five genres with a 10% increase in hours watched, helped by a 57% year-over-year increase in unique channels. Marvel Rivals and PUBG Mobile were significant contributors to shooter viewership compared to the previous year.
MMORPGs replaced simulation games in the top 10 genres, largely due to the popularity of Roblox. The 82 million hours watched for Roblox represent 19% of the viewership for the entire MMORPG genre across all platforms this quarter.
Brands Gaining Traction on Streaming Platforms
“Minecraft” retained its position as the most talked-about brand on Twitch in Q2 2025, with a 9% quarter-over-quarter increase in unique chatters driven by “A Minecraft Movie” release and brand collaboration announcements.
Nintendo and Xbox both saw increases in mentions by Twitch viewers (+48% and +5%, respectively), aided by their highly anticipated showcase events: the Nintendo Switch 2 announcement and Xbox Games Showcase 2025.
“Star Wars” experienced a 62% increase in brand mentions due to the annual “May the 4th” celebrations and Fortnite’s “Galactic Battle” collaboration.
The report concludes that while Twitch’s dominance is gradually eroding, the overall live streaming market is expanding as alternative platforms gain traction and creators diversify their streaming presence across multiple platforms. The e-sports ecosystem is adapting to fewer but higher-impact events, with co-streamers playing an increasingly significant role in viewership distribution.
All images are credited to Stream Hatchet. Get the full report here.
David Adler is an entrepreneur and freelance blog post writer who enjoys writing about business, entrepreneurship, travel and the influencer marketing space.
The global live streaming market has surpassed 9 billion quarterly hours watched for the first time in nearly four years, according to Stream Hatchet’s “Q2 2025 Live-Streaming Trends Report.” The market recorded 9.1 billion hours watched in Q2 2025, representing a 5% year-over-year increase and crossing the 9 billion threshold for the first time since Q3 2021.
Platform Competition
While Twitch maintains its market leadership with 54.2% share, the platform recorded its lowest quarterly figure of hours watched since Q3 2020, falling below 5 billion hours (4.9B) for the first time in nearly five years. This marks Twitch’s fourth consecutive quarterly decline in hours watched.
YouTube Gaming achieved a milestone during the quarter, registering its highest-ever quarterly viewership with 2.2 billion hours watched, though its market share decreased slightly by 1% to 24.3%.
Kick continues its strong growth trajectory, improving its market share by 5.5% compared to Q2 2024 and approaching the 1 billion quarterly hours watched milestone with 983 million hours in Q2. The platform has doubled its non-gaming viewership year-over-year to 378 million hours.
“The success of alternative platforms such as Kick (+113% YoY) and Chzzk (+37%) continues to drive up viewership across all platforms combined,” notes the report.
Korean streaming platform Chzzk logged its third consecutive quarter with over 200 million hours watched, securing 2.7% of market share. The platform is benefiting from Twitch’s ban in South Korea, implemented in Q1 2024.
Smaller platforms showed remarkable growth, with KakaoTV registering an extraordinary 436,000% year-over-year growth from just 3,000 hours watched in Q2 2024. Indian platforms Loco (+44,000%) and Russian platform VK (+15,000%) also continued their resurgence.
Creator Migration
The migration of top streamers to alternative platforms is reshaping viewership distribution. The report identifies ten creators who recorded over 1 million hours watched on Kick in Q2 2025 despite having no viewership on the platform in Q2 2024.
Most notable is Zackrawrr’s high-profile move to Kick in June 2025, which helped him claim the title of most-watched creator in Q2 2025 with 28.6 million hours watched. His decision to simulcast on Kick gained him an additional 2.1 million hours watched and increased his overall viewership by 130% year-over-year.
However, results vary among streamers making platform shifts. While Zackrawrr benefited from simulcasting, Brazilian creator Baiano saw an 18% decline in total hours watched over the same period despite moving to Kick.
E-sports Viewership
E-sports viewership increased by 6% year-over-year to 729 million hours watched, the highest Q2 figure since 2023. This growth comes despite a 37% reduction in the number of tournaments (404 vs. 637 in Q2 2024).
The report highlights the increasing concentration of viewership, with the top three most-watched tournaments—2025 BLAST.tv Austin Major, LCK Rounds 1-2 2025, and MPL Indonesia Season 15—comprising 35% of the total hours watched, compared to just 22% for the top three events in Q2 2024.
Co-streaming continues to gain prominence in esports viewership. In Q1 2025, overall co-streamer viewership surpassed official esports channel viewership for the first time. While official channels grew 30% quarter-over-quarter in Q2, co-streamers still managed to claim an equal share of quarterly hours watched at 363 million.
“The number of co-streaming channels that achieved higher than 50K peak viewers in Q2 2025 was 35% higher than the previous year (50 channels vs. 37), while the number of official channels achieving that milestone fell 17%, from 76 to 63,” the report states.
Game Popularity and New Releases
“Grand Theft Auto V” reclaimed the top position in quarterly live streaming rankings for the first time since Q2 2024 with 515 million hours watched, an 18% quarter-over-quarter increase. The game’s Kick viewership alone increased by 67% compared to Q1 2025.
“Call of Duty: Warzone” rose six positions with a 104% increase in viewership following the well-received reintroduction of the “Verdansk” map. “Mobile Legends: Bang Bang” viewership increased 53% quarter-over-quarter, bolstered by MPL Indonesia Season 15, which contributed 75 million hours watched.
Among new releases, “Elden Ring Nightreign,” was the most-watched title in Q2 2025 with 41.6 million hours watched in its first 30 days. On its first day, it reached 7.7 million hours watched, a figure which over the last two years is second only to “Monster Hunter Wilds” and “Call of Duty Black Ops: 6.”
“Mario Kart World” and “Clair Obscur: Expedition 33” both garnered over 30 million hours of viewership. An interesting case is “Peak,” the co-op climbing game, which recorded only 83,000 hours watched in its first 24 hours but reached over 27 million hours in the first 30 days, with the number of unique channels streaming it increasing nearly tenfold from 29,000 after one week to 308,000 after a month.
Gaming Events and High Engagement
The Nintendo Switch 2 launch announcement on April 2 was the standout live-streaming event of the quarter, with a peak of 3.3 million concurrent viewers on Nintendo’s official Japanese YouTube channel. The Nintendo of America YouTube Gaming channel recorded a peak of 1.4 million viewers for the same event.
Summer Game Fest featured the highest chat activity among gaming showcase events in Q2 2025, with 98,300 messages posted across all Twitch channels during the minute the “Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds” trailer started, eclipsing the 69,000 messages posted at the moment of the “Resident Evil 9” reveal at the same event.
The surprise reveal of “Call of Duty: Black Ops 7” at the Xbox Showcase sparked 45,800 messages, while Nintendo Direct’s Switch 2 release date announcement and the “Marvel Tokon Fighting Souls” trailer generated similar levels of engagement with 38,000 chat messages.
Content Categories and Streaming Genres
Non-gaming content continues to cement its position as the most-watched live-streaming category with 1.59 billion hours watched, a 28% increase year-over-year. This growth is primarily driven by Kick, which has doubled its non-gaming viewership year-over-year.
Shooter games moved into the top five genres with a 10% increase in hours watched, helped by a 57% year-over-year increase in unique channels. Marvel Rivals and PUBG Mobile were significant contributors to shooter viewership compared to the previous year.
MMORPGs replaced simulation games in the top 10 genres, largely due to the popularity of Roblox. The 82 million hours watched for Roblox represent 19% of the viewership for the entire MMORPG genre across all platforms this quarter.
Brands Gaining Traction on Streaming Platforms
“Minecraft” retained its position as the most talked-about brand on Twitch in Q2 2025, with a 9% quarter-over-quarter increase in unique chatters driven by “A Minecraft Movie” release and brand collaboration announcements.
Nintendo and Xbox both saw increases in mentions by Twitch viewers (+48% and +5%, respectively), aided by their highly anticipated showcase events: the Nintendo Switch 2 announcement and Xbox Games Showcase 2025.
“Star Wars” experienced a 62% increase in brand mentions due to the annual “May the 4th” celebrations and Fortnite’s “Galactic Battle” collaboration.
The report concludes that while Twitch’s dominance is gradually eroding, the overall live streaming market is expanding as alternative platforms gain traction and creators diversify their streaming presence across multiple platforms. The e-sports ecosystem is adapting to fewer but higher-impact events, with co-streamers playing an increasingly significant role in viewership distribution.
All images are credited to Stream Hatchet.
Get the full report here.
Checkout Our Latest Podcast