Dota 2 hits the lowest peak player count since January 2014

Well, it looks like the Outlanders Patch wasn’t the saviour after all. It looks like Dota 2 is declining quite rapidly after the onset of the 7.23 patch with the peak player count hitting lows we’ve not seen since January 2014.

Image Courtesy: Steam Charts

This occurred right after Valve released an update to The Outlanders on November 25th, which added neutral item drops, outposts and two new heroes of Void Spirit and Snapfire to the game. In less than 15 days, the online peak in Dota 2 fell by almost 200k - from 693k on November 23rd to 510k on December 11th.

Image Courtesy: Steam Charts

This is certainly worrying for long-term fans of the game, considering the fact that, in October 2019, the average online number of Dota 2 users declined to 388 thousand people, which is the lowest in the past five years. There is clearly a downward trend in the popularity of the game for casual players. 

Image Courtesy: SteamDB

However, the game is still is doing really well in the esports viewership metrics.

Image Courtesy: SteamDB

Perhaps this is a sign of the evolution of Dota 2. More people prefer to watch the best players play the game, rather than playing the game themselves. Just like traditional sports like football or tennis.