Just in case anyone hadn't quite grasped just how much of a force to be reckoned with Steam is when it comes to PC gaming, the storefront has once again passed its all-time concurrent player peak. While alternative clients may offer something different, such as Epic Games Store giving away free games on the regular, Valve's software is by far the most dominant in the market, becoming the go-to place for tens of millions of PC gamers to download titles from.
In fact, Steam passed a huge milestone not long ago when figures showed that 31.9 million concurrent players had been logged, more than nine million of whom were in-game. Beginning life in the early 2000s, it was initially conceived as a way for Valve to better distribute its own games, as well as keep them updated easily. There were teething problems when the service was officially launched in September 2003, suffering from network outages and bugs. However, the numbers show that it's a different story today, as the client eclipses other digital PC gaming storefronts.
SteamDB, a third party website that chronicles all things related to Steam, shows that the number of concurrent players has now reached more than 32 million. The exact number is 32,186,301, making it the most amount of people who have been logged in since the software went live nearly 20 years ago. On top of this, the chart shows that 10,082,055 were in a game at that point, so this is another huge milestone. Given just how quickly Steam has seen an increase in players, it will be interesting to see how soon these figures will be smashed.
Although a staple in the PC gaming world, much of this recent success could be attested to Valve's Steam Deck, which the company launched last February to high praise. In fact, it went down as one of the best pieces of gaming hardware for 2022, with it being noteworthy for not just being a handheld console that can play a user's Steam games, but for essentially being a mobile PC as well.
Although Valve's early success was in video game development, having released the iconic Half-Life back in 1998, these days many know it for its Steam service. While Gabe Newell and his team do still make games, it's become pretty evident over the years that its PC storefront is its most lucrative asset, especially going off these latest figures.