The Steam logo with some games in the background, such as Cyberpunk 2077 and Stardew Valley.
Image via Steam.

Steam set a new concurrent player record over the weekend

Almost 35 million of us!

Having turned 20 last year and being a dominant force in digital PC gaming, it’s hard to imagine Steam got off to a rocky start when it launched in 2003. However, here we are, and the Valve service continues to reign supreme, as it reaches another concurrent player milestone.

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According to the latest figures from SteamDB, 34,649,583 players were using Steam over the weekend. To put that into perspective (not that it really needs it), Worldometer shows the population of the UK is over 67.8 million people. This means Steam’s new record was roughly half of the UK populace.

Screenshot from SteamDB showing over 34 million people had been logged into Steam.
Screenshot via Destructoid.

This might partly because of the ongoing Dinos vs. Robots sale (as well as the many events that take place throughout the year), which ends today. Who knows, but it goes to prove that PC gaming in the modern era is showing no signs of slowing down.

Some were twiddling their thumbs, though

Okay, so 34.6 million is a staggering amount. However, of those, only (“only“) 11.1 million were actually in-game, according to the breakdown below the graph. In total, the number equates to a 3.8% increase over February 2024. There. That’s a little extra statistic for ya.

Originally built as a way for people to update Valve games over the internet, a lot of people struggled to adapt to the digital changes that were about to happen in gaming. As a result, Steam was not very popular during its early years.

That seems inconceivable these days what with how the industry operates. Nowadays, we probably couldn’t imagine a world in which we can’t instantly download a game or a much-needed patch, especially given the state some releases are in on launch day.


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Author
Image of Andrew Heaton
Andrew Heaton
Andrew has been a gamer since the 17th century Restoration period. He now writes for a number of online publications, contributing news and other articles. He does not own a powdered wig.