Steam has summed up 2023, calling it a “landmark year for Valve.” The platform set several new records, while also introducing multiple features/improvements for both players and developers.
- As announced in a blog post, Steam set a new record for concurrent users last year, peaking at over 33 million CCU. In fact, it attracted even more concurrents in January 2024 — 33.67 million CCU.
- More than 500 games reached over $3 million in gross revenue last year for the first time in the platform’s history. As Valve noted, “that’s more than double the number of games hitting the same threshold five years earlier in 2018.”
- Over 25% of the top 20 new releases by revenue were from developers launching their first games on Steam.
- During the 2023 Autumn Sale, which covers the Black Friday and Cyber Monday events, the number of titles to earn over $1 million in gross revenue increased by 21% year-over-year. And the number of games to gross over $500k during the sale grew 19% compared to 2022.
- From December 20 to December 31, 2023, Steam users redeemed over $80 million in physical gift cards.
- In 2023, 11.8 million players used the Playtest feature, up 41% year-over-year. Valve thinks it became an important tool for developers, especially those making multiplayer titles, adding that “The Finals had such a successful Playtest that we needed to improve the system to make it faster and more efficient to add new users to an active Playtest.”
- More than 44 million votes were cast for the final selection at the Steam Awards last year.
- Fun fact: Steam is a 100% global platform, operating on all seven continents. “At current time of writing we’ve delivered 200GB of installs and updates to Antarctica in the last seven days,” Vale wrote.
- Speaking of the most important features introduced last year, the company cited a new user interface, a new Big Picutre mode, a Shopping Cart update (including inline gifting for multiple friends), trailer categorization, DLC browsing, and more.
- Steam also improved its UTM tracking system, adding regional splits and improved source attribution for non-Steam traffic. “In terms of UTM tracking, Steamworks now breaks out new vs. returning users, and reports conversions within 24 hours,” Valve explained. “We also separate out mobile traffic from desktop traffic, supported with an easy visualization to see wishlists, purchases, and key activations from tracked visits.”
- One of the most important visibility features developed in 2023 was Daily Deal self-scheduling, which allows developers to schedule their eligible games (based on revenue and player numbers) in front-page promo slots. “We’ve also expanded the roster of slots, so even more studios can benefit from these opportunities,” Vale said.
- The company also added the Indonesian language to Steam, saying that “much of Steam’s growth in the last decade has come from improving language, currency, and payment method support to bring more players into the PC ecosystem.”
Details about other features and milestones can be found in the full article.