In 2021, when most businesses suffered the effects of the Covid-19 crisis by closing doors and laying off staff, the video game industry saw a boom in sales. According to research by 123scommesse, video game publishers and developers also saw a massive increase in the number of downloads and users.
What Prompted the Growth of the Digital Gaming Sector in 2021?
With the mandated lockdowns and restrictions happening since 2019, millions of people turned to video games as a way to combat the adverse effects of extended stays indoors with an easy-to-obtain source of entertainment.
The digital video game market is expected to reach sales of almost US $150 billion for 2021. According to research data from 123scommese, it translates to a 40% increase in sales in just two years. With no sign of slowing down, the global digital video game market is expected to keep numbers soaring.
Mobile gaming figures are even more staggering. By 2025, figures will reach over US $150 billion – a dramatic jump of about 44% for this market.
Digital Gaming Industry Sales Predicted to Soar
According to a Statista survey in 2019, the digital gaming industry generated over US $104 billion in revenue. After the pandemic hit and forced many people to stay at home, revenue increased by 23% to over US $128 billion by the following year.
If this trend continues on an upward trajectory, sales will be over US $140 billion by the end of 2021. By 2025, the entirety of the video game market could achieve well over US $205 billion in sales. Let’s explore the numbers in mobile, and online gaming, and downloaded games:
Mobile Gaming
Over the last two years, mobile gaming became the most popular genre in the digital video gaming industry. Due to this drastic increase, the industry expects to generate revenue of close to US $104 billion by the end of 2021. That’s a whopping 44% jump in sales. At the end of 2025, the market may increase by an additional 45%, with sales above US $151 billion.
Online Gaming
Online gaming also gained popularity when lockdowns worldwide forced people to distance themselves physically. Friends found a way to interact and have fun together. It meant significant growth for online game sales, with increases of 36% over just two years. Sales jumped from US $16.8 billion in 2019 to over US $22 billion in 2021. According to projections, these figures could increase to over US $30 billion by 2025.
Downloaded Games
At times, access to physical stores was difficult during the pandemic. Downloading games was not only more accessible for players during this time but also very lucrative for sellers. Downloaded games went from US $13.2 billion before the pandemic hit to over US $2.8 billion by 2021 – a massive 43% increase in sales in the gaming network industry.
More and More Gamers
The pandemic created over 430 million gamers. In 2019, there were around 1.7 billion gamers worldwide. That figure jumped over two billion in the last year. By the end of 2021, there should be around 2.15 billion gamers across the globe. The numbers will likely continue to rise to about 2.5 billion by the year 2025.
Sales by Country
China anticipates sales of over US $49 billion by the end of 2021, which would mean an increase of 46% in just two years. By 2025, this market will increase to over US $70 billion. Following closely behind China is the United States, with a projected US $42.2 billion in sales, up from US $23 billion in 2019. Japan comes in third, expecting to reach US $18.2 billion in sales this year.
