Just days after setting a new record for itself, Steam has reached a new concurrent player record. The digital game distribution platform shows no signs of slowing down, despite competition from others.
At one time, Steam was just about the only digital distribution gaming platform out there, but at the moment, its biggest competitor is most likely Epic Games Store. The platform regularly releases free games for its players, but it doesn't look like it's going to dethrone Steam anytime soon.
Valve's new Steam concurrent user record is 30,049,264 concurrent players, according to SteamDB, which tracks user counts in games and on the platform in general. The company breached 30 million users for the first time just a few days ago, and it seems it wasn't a fluke, as the number has risen even further. There's likely a few factors behind this growth, and Valve may end up breaking another record during its iconic holiday sales period.
One of the core reasons for Steam's growth recently is the improved availability of gaming PC parts. Due to a variety of factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic, it was difficult for gamers to acquire what they needed to play recent, resource-heavy video games on a PC. Video cards saw huge mark-ups by scalpers, making it so that players either had to spend way more than normal or wait. However, things have begun to stabilize recently, and Nvidia has introduced its RTX 4000 series, reducing the demand for the less-powerful but still impressive 3000 line, and giving players more affordable options as a result.
In addition, more games are coming to PC that players used to have to buy a console to try. PlayStation exclusives, in particular, have started to come to PCs, in some cases a few months to a year after release, or occasionally, simultaneously. Acclaimed titles like Marvel's Spider-Man and Horizon Zero Dawn are available on Steam, and gamers may be visiting some iconic PS4 and PS5 games on PC as a result, further boosting Steam's user count.
While many of Valve's game series have gone quiet over the years, its gaming platform clearly isn't fading away. With that said, Gabe Newell and others have confirmed that Valve has multiple games in production. It remains to be seen what they are or when they'll be revealed to the public, but once a new Valve game launches, the Steam platform will probably see a surge in users all over again.