Valorant India Invitational Final Claims to Have Recorded 9 Million Viewers

The first-ever international Valorant tournament to take place on LAN in India, Valorant India Invitational claims to have achieved more than nine million viewers during the grand final match between Paper Rex and Team Heretics.

As per a release, the tournament organized by Galaxy Racer recorded a massive influx of viewers during the best-of-five grand final between two international contenders, Paper Rex from Singapore and Team Heretics from Spain.

Out of the overall viewership for the grand final, the Hindi speaking audience is claimed to have accounted for about six million viewers.

Valorant India Invitational grand finals reportedly clocks more than nine million viewers

The first international Valorant tournament to take place on LAN from the South Asian region was quite the spectacle, running in partnership with Asia's largest music festival - Sunburn, to present a unique blend of esports and music to the Indian audience.

Six international teams competed in this tournament alongside two Indian teams, GodSquad (Global Esports) barely missing out on a chance to qualify for the Playoffs as three teams were tied with a '2-1' score during the Group Stage.

As expected, two of the strongest teams competing in this tournament - Paper Rex and Team Heretics, who were also the table toppers of their respective groups, faced each other in the grand finals.

The five game series did not go the distance with the Singaporean team pulling off a comfortable '3-1' victory but it was enough to reportedly attain a total viewership of more than nine million spectators across Galaxy Racer India's YouTube, Twitch, and Glance's gaming platforms.

According to Esports Charts, an analytical service that provides comprehensive metrics for esports broadcasts and live streams, Valorant India Invitational clocked a peak of 50,289 concurrent viewers which was observed during the grand final, while the average for the tournament was 20,357 viewers.

Siddharth Ravishankar - Chief Gaming Officer at Galaxy Racer, commenting on the reported viewership numbers for the tournament said, "The astounding viewership indicates that Esports is set to make history in India, both in terms of growth and the growing interest among Esports fans. Competitive Esports events like the Valorant India Invitational are setting a high standard and working towards propelling the industry to great heights and the response is a testament to that journey."

If the viewership numbers released by the organizer's are accurate, then it is on the higher end of the spectrum for the region. It is certainly surprising considering the fact that the tournament had faced heavy delays due to mismanagement which had resulted in multiple members of the Valorant India community calling out the organizers for failing to host the matches on time.

So while the tournament did pull off impressive numbers, not everything was smooth and dandy, with several things standing out that the organizer's can learn from and improve upon for future events.