Mobile esports – the word which is constantly on our lips here at esportsguide. Accordingly, we thought to ourselves – how do mobile esports compare to PC esports right now? Indeed, that’s a tough question to ask. Just like that, we’ve dug up some statistics to try and shed some light on the situation – read on for a State of the Community episode on Mobile Esports!
To go about doing this, we’ve collected some event statistics. Indeed, which events and which esports should be consulted? To have a fair comparison, we’ve selected the top 3 esports from both sides and chosen a top event from their calendar in the past two years.
Here are the esports we’ve selected:
- Mobile Esports – Arena of Valor, PUBG Mobile and Free Fire
- PC Esports – League of Legends, Dota 2 and CS:GO
With regards to statistics, we’ll be presenting the typical Peak and Average viewership for each event. Such statistics show us how popular these events are – something a prize pool doesn’t. We want to know how close mobile esports are getting to PC esports in this regard.
All statistics are thanks to those made publicly available by Esports Charts.
Mobile Esports Event Statistics
Arena of Valor – Arena of Valor Premier League 2020
- 670,768 – Peak Viewers
- 159,995 – Average Viewers
PUBG Mobile – PUBG Mobile Global Championship Season 0
- 3,801,998 – Peak Viewers
- 528,822 – Average Viewers
Free Fire – Free Fire World Series 2019 Rio
- 2,016,157 – Peak Viewers
- 1,280,050 – Average Viewers
PC Esports Event Statistics
League of Legends – Worlds 2020
- 3,882,252 – Peak Viewers
- 1,113,702 – Average Viewers
DOTA 2 – The International 2019
- 1,968,497 – Peak Viewers
- 728,873 – Average Viewers
Do note that due to last year’s cancellation of the event, we’ve had to settle for the next best thing with the 2019 iteration.
CS:GO – IEM Katowice 2020
- 1,002,132 – Peak Viewers
- 279,453 – Average Viewers
Discussion – How Close is Close?
Wow – just make sure you’ve properly gone over those statistics.
Let’s start with mobile. While Arena of Valor definitely has some work to do, the break out titles of Free Fire and PUBG Mobile have torn the roof right off. The PMGC0 achieved almost a higher peak of viewership than the praised Worlds 2020 event!
Furthermore, the Free Fire World Series 2019 Rio event holds onto the title of having the highest Average Viewers from all of the events listed above. However, overall, PC esports tend to win over a higher Average Viewers for the most part.
In my opinion, I would say it’s currently very close – especially considering that PC esports has been established for a much greater period of time. Indeed, for perspective, League of Legends has been around since 2009 while PUBG Mobile launched in 2017.
One limitation I’ll have to point out is that yes, I only included one event per esport – this was to make it fair. Indeed, a platform is not identified by one single esport. Indeed, one further limitation is that such statistics do not take into consideration physical viewership.
Conclusion – Mobile Esports Has the Momentum
While overall viewership might be close, I think I’m confident enough to go out on a limb and say that during this time of online events due to health, mobile esports has thrived over PC esports. Accordingly, due to the youth of the platform, many of the events were already being held online and hence, did not suffer much hindrance when the world flipped on its head – perhaps that’s why they’ve caught up to PC esports.
I think it’s safe to say that in our next episode of Esports Tier List – you’ll find that mobile esports has a strong presence. Here at esportsguide we’re determined to provide our readers with up-to-date and essential know-how into the industry – mobile esports have quickly sky-rocketed and may be slowly taking over in 2021.
For more esports news, visit: https://www.esportsguide.com/news
