How Many People Play Minecraft in 2023? (User & Growth Stats)
When games are considered classics, they just never really die out. Fans of the game will continue to flock towards it regardless of updates, upgrades, or changes. This is true for games like Minecraft, the classic game that has been around since 2009, and it’s been thriving all over the world. Since we still hear about Minecraft on a regular basis, let’s see how many people play Minecraft?
Minecraft currently has 173,508,871 Average Monthly Players according to the data provided by ActivePlayer.io. The data also show that Minecraft is consistently losing a small number of players each month. However, for such an old game, the current numbers are still a phenomenal success. That won’t be topped easily by future games.
Despite its simplicity, it’s incredible how this game managed to rack up such good numbers. Next, I’ll go more into detail about the number of players Minecraft currently has.
What’s the maximum number of players per day
We’re early in 2023, but for now, Minecraft’s active player count doesn’t seem to be dwindling by a significant number. The game reports 173,508,871 active monthly players on average in the last 30 days.
While Minecraft experiences a few inactive players every couple of months. The tendency of players to get back into the game is high, and there are new players yearly.
Minecraft has consistently rated well in sales currently. The video game is on the list of most-downloaded applications of Google Play. In addition, it is the most-downloaded paid game app on the Google play store.
According to Google Play, the app was downloaded on more than 10 million different devices.
The app also keeps the gameplay interesting. There aren’t many changes in how to play the game, but things like new maps get added every now and then. For example, people started to get active with the game again in the year 2022 because of the Hogwarts map.
The game also gets good exposure due to the number of streams and YouTube game content creators deciding to show the game on their channels. Forbes stated that the game has been watched on YouTube over 201 billion times.
Below is a table of Minecraft’s current active users and the highest number of active users they have gotten within a day for the last 6 months.
| Month | Average Monthly Players | Monthly Gain/Loss | Monthly Gain/Loss % | Peak Players in a Day |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Last 30 Days | 173,508,871 | +707,726 | +0.41 | 17,350,887.00 |
| December 2022 | 172,801,145 | +995,605 | +0.58 | 17,280,115.00 |
| November 2022 | 171,805,540 | -160,514 | -0.09 | 17,180,554.00 |
| October 2022 | 171,966,054 | -889,962 | -0.51 | 17,196,605.00 |
| September 2022 | 172,856,016 | –246,100 | -0.14 | 17,285,602.00 |
| August 2022 | 173,102,116 | +452,000 | +0.26 | 17,310,212.00 |
As you can see the number of players is decreasing but not by much. It certainly is not enough to make Mincerafts popularity suffer in the long run.
Minecraft players by country
Every year Minecraft generates millions of sales. About 200 million copies of Minecraft were sold worldwide over the past year. It seems the pandemic has boosted up sales for video games since people were looking for things to do during the lockdown.
Statista recorded the sales of other years of the video game as well. The first time Minecraft hit its first 100 million units sold was back in 2016. Since then, the sales have been growing steadily worldwide.
The US gaming community is one of the largest in the world. According to Playercounter, 21% of all Minecraft players come from the US. Meanwhile, 6.17% come from Brazil, 5.59% come from Russia, $5.06 from the UK, and 4.60% from Germany.
Minecraft players by device
Minecraft can be played on multiple platforms aside from PC. It’s been available for Consoles such as the Playstation 3, Xbox 360, Playstation 4, and Xbox One. The Pocket Edition is also widely popular, allowing users to download their games on their mobile devices so they can play.
A lot of people still like the feel of using the game through a console. In the previous study by Gamestats, up to 68% of Minecraft players use the Playstation 4 as their console of choice. Meanwhile, 28% favor using their Playstation 3, and about 4% use a vita to play the game.
In August 2020, Xbox one reported a total of 5.43 million Minecraft copies were sold for their console worldwide. The video game also had over 10 million downloads on different devices using the Google Play App store.
How many people have left Minecraft?
Minecraft is slowly but steadily losing a small percentage of players each month according to the data provided by ActivePlayer.io.
The decline started in the month of January, probably because of the end of Christmas break and the Holidays. As a result, Minecraft saw about 989,911 players leave the game. By the end of February, another 517,113 users became inactive. ActivePlayer.io reported that the video game lost 1,499,027 players over the last 30 days since the first week of March.
In the last 30 days, Minecraft lost around -0.51% of players compared to September. You can check out the data for the last 6 months in the table below.
| Month | Player Gain/Loss | Percentage of Player Gain/Loss |
|---|---|---|
| Last 30 days | +707,726 | -0.41 |
| December 2022 | +995,605 | +0.58 |
| November 2022 | -160,514 | -0.09 |
| October 2022 | -889,962 | -0.51 |
| September 2022 | -246,100 | -0.14 |
| August 2022 | +452,000 | 0.26 |
How much money did Minecraft make so far?
So far in 2022, Minecraft Mobile earned $71.32 Million as reported by Statista.
Statista has already released the revenue for the mobile version of Minecraft. The video game is apparently a huge success even in the mobile gaming community. In 2015, the video game generated about $81.68 million in profit. Fast forward to 2019, the game hit its first $100 million, with total revenue of $111 million.
By the time the Mobile game hit in 2020, the company had gained $142 million in revenue from the game. Finally, in 2021, which is the last reported year for revenue, Minecraft mobile generated $160.69 million in revenue. So, despite the decline of active players, I’m still hopeful that this game can still generate more revenue in the years to come.
Meanwhile, the last total revenue for Minecraft on all platforms was recorded in the year 2020. According to the last report, the video game had a total revenue that amounted to $415 million. For both 2021 and 2022, we have numbers available for Minecraft Mobile.
| Year | Revenue |
|---|---|
| 2012 | $211 Million |
| 2013 | $326 Million |
| 2014 | $165 Million |
| 2015 | $350 Million |
| 2016 | $420 Million |
| 2017 | $370 Million |
| 2018 | $500 Million |
| 2019 | $375 Million |
| 2020 | $415 Million |
| 2021 | $160.69 Million (Minecraft Mobile only) |
| 2022 | $71.32 Million (Minecraft Mobile only) |
Other interesting facts about Minecraft
The game Minecraft was both developed and published in 2011 by Mojang Studios, meaning the game has existed for over a decade. Since the game’s release, it has become one of the most favored 3D sandbox games of all time. While the game has attracted most people in their mid-20s, about 68% of boys between the ages of 6 and 8 years old are reported to play Minecraft.
Also, despite Minecraft doing okay in the market even before, the rights to the game were still sold to Microsoft. Microsoft managed to acquire ownership of the game for $2.5 Billion in the year 2014. It was a great investment by Microsoft since the game has been doing well in charts and sales.
Microsoft makes sure to generate income through other mods and add-ons in the game. According to their third quarter in the fiscal year of 2021, these in-game purchases were downloaded by players over 1 billion times. This move added to over $350 million in Minecraft sales across the globe.
With its first 3 months under Microsoft, the game managed to earn over $1 million through selling in-game merchandise on the official marketplace. In addition, content creators partnered with the game can also offer maps, texture packs, and character skins for a player.
If people thought the most-watched game on YouTube was Among Us in 2020, they are wrong. Minecraft is actually the most viewed game on Youtube in the year 2020. Accordingly, the game has been seen over 201 billion times on the video platform. In addition, Roblox, a game that is constantly compared to Minecraft, has also landed as the second-most-viewed game on YouTube.
Meanwhile, in 2022 the game is in the Top 10 most viewed games over at Twitch, currently, holding the #9 position, having 49,169 weekly viewers on average across 1,744 channels per week.
The game is popular since it is open to almost all ages. In fact, the game is even recommended for kids ages 8 and up because it is believed to help them explore their creativity. The game is also not overly violent and has easy to teach and learn the commands.
Parents don’t have to be too worried about getting this game for their children. In fact, the game has an integrated educational component, where the game is actually used to teach lessons.
It’s safe to say that Minecraft is one of the most popular games in the video game industry. Despite the recent decline of active users, the game has a long way from actually dying. With all its extensions and modes, this sandbox game is easily a timeless classic that can be enjoyed by all ages.
Where can I get Minecraft?
It’s possible to purchase the Java Edition from Mojan’s website for $26.95. Meanwhile, a Windows 10 version is available in the Microsoft Store for $29.99.
You can also play the classic version of the game online for free. Playing it this way doesn’t require you to install or download the game. This treat was given to us by Minecraft’s 10th year of celebration.
