Counter-Strike leads viewership growth across esports in 2025
2025 has been a phenomenal year for Counter-Strike and most of the community have termed it as "The Year of Vitality" with the French organization bagging both Counter-Strike Majors at Austin and Budapest while winning nearly every single S-tier event they attended. Esports viewership saw the biggest rise (+41.9%) after the COVID-19 pandemic but dipped immediately in 2022 as per an Esports Charts report. It took a couple of years to regain the stats but the numbers have been steadily climbing since 2024 with Counter-Strike leading the way.
2025 saw a 1.5% increase in watch hours across all of esports, pushing the tally over 3.3 billion watch hours. While established mobile titles like Battlegrounds Mobile India and PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds continued to contribute to the rise, Counter-Strike stood a step above, with a staggering 33% increase in watch hours over 2024.
Returning tournament organizers like StarLadder combined with new entries in the tier-2 space saw a huge amount of investment into the competitive space, bringing in more tournaments which in turn increased the number of "premium matchups" which drew in an unfathomable amount of viewers across various platforms.
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