• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, September 5, 2023

Twitch commands a 74% share of the global streaming audience — up from 70% a year ago, according to a report from Stream Hatchet.

In addition, Twitch earned $2.8 billion in revenue in 2022 — up from $2.675 billion in 2021 and $275 million in 2016, per Superdata.

However, Twitch’s total users dropped by 450,000 over the past year, to 7.59 million, according to data from online casino Casinos en Ligne.

The livestreaming app, focused on video gaming, esports, music broadcasts, creative content and “in real life” streams and owned by Amazon subsidiary Twitch Interactive, saw its user base leap from about 3 million to 4 million in 2018 to a peak of 9.9 million in January 2021, following pandemic lockdowns.

But its at-least-once-per-month users plunged by 1.3 million in 2021, from 8.5 million to 7 million in 2022, and from 7.55 million this January to 6.82 million in May.

The number has rebounded to 7.6 million since then, but is still down 2.3 million compared to the January 2021 peak.

Average per-month viewers were 2.4 million in August — down 200,000 versus August 2022.

However, twitch channels rose from about 91,100 to 94,100 between August 2022 and August 2023, and its 843 billion year-to-date minutes are up 4.3% versus the same period in 2022.

Experts attribute some of the falloff in users to Twitch’s decision to reduce its revenue sharing for creators from 70% to 50% in October 2022, according to Gia on the Move. It reinstated 70% just a few months later, but introduced minimum viewer thresholds and other requirements.

In addition, in July, Twitch instituted unpopular changes in branded content policies, including banning burned-in, banner and audio ads.

But Twitch is not alone.

Although overall video gaming viewership is still up 46% versus Q1 2020, hours watched have declined for six straight quarters, including a 16% drop to 7.4 billion in Q1 2023, from 8.8 billion Q1 2022. Hours watched peaked in 2021, at about 9 billion.

As Twitch gained 4% market share YoY, and YouTube’s share rose from 13% to 15%, Facebook’s share declined to 3% in Q1 2023, down from 9% in the year-ago quarter.