Livestreaming’s Boom and the Avid Fans of Minecraft

Livestreaming ballooned during the pandemic, but as the world reopened, the hours people spent watching streams started to decline. Now usage is rising again.  

Total hours watched on Twitch rose to 1.81 billion in May from 1.78 billion the month prior, according to new data from StreamElements, a marketing and livestreaming startup, and its data analytics partner Rainmaker.gg. Facebook Gaming increased to 350 million hours from 335 million over the same time period, the most recent data available. Even with a dip between February to April, livestreaming is more popular than it was before lockdowns. The current viewership on Twitch, for example, is 80% higher than its pre-pandemic peak, StreamElements noted.