Steam’s top 10 games captured over 60% of revenue in 2023

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Steam had a record breaking 2023, but Valve’s PC games storefront is increasingly becoming a “winner take all” marketplace according to Video Game Insights. The firm’s latest report shows that full game revenues grew 18% to $9 billion in 2023, doubling 2019’s total. Games released in 2023 accounted for $3 billion or a third of full games revenue last year.

However, the top 10 new releases captured about $1.85 billion of all full game revenues. These 10 titles account for 20% of all full game revenue on Steam in 2023 and 61% of all full game revenues from new releases. This proportion has grown 50% from 2019 where the top 10 new games captured 41% of new full game revenues.

Notably, Baldur’s Gate 3 was the biggest winner. Alone, the title earned an estimated $657 million in full game revenue or 21% of all revenue earned by 2023’s releases. All together, the top 100 new games accounted for 91% of full game revenue from 2023 releases.

Part of this concentrated success could be a result of the record breaking number of games released on Steam. Nearly 14,000 games were launched on Steam in 2023, up 13% from the prior year. Only 181 (1.3%) of these releases were double-A or triple-A titles. Notably, only 309 new releases were free-to-play meaning most games are included in the tracked full game revenues.

Of these titles released on Steam in 2023, only a fraction earned significant revenue from full game sales. About 700 (5%) of 2023’s releases made over $100,000 in full game revenue.

This concentrated success isn’t limited to new releases. Zooming out to the full marketplace, 930 games made over $1