IEM Katowice 2023 viewership took a major hit compared to previous years, leaving fans wondering what were the causes behind it.
The most-watched game of the CS:GO tournament was naturally the final between G2 Esports and Heroic, which recorded 726,717 peak viewers, according to Esports Charts. Still, it’s a huge drop compared to the previous year, when the grand final series between FaZe Clan and G2 boasted 1,122,015 viewers, meaning that this year’s edition recorded a 36 percent drop.
Related: G2’s CS:GO star breaks down the team’s journey to IEM Katowice championship
The numbers for IEM Katowice 2023 also look bleak when it comes to average viewers, and as a result, hours watched. Despite the same format, this year’s event had 235,623 average viewers, who produced 23,503,319 hours watched. IEM Katowice 2022, on the other hand, had 328,068 and 29,936,138 average viewers and hours watched, respectively.
While there is no exact reason for the sudden drop in viewership, there may be a few factors. One of them could be the fact that last year’s champions, FaZe, who are quite popular in the CS:GO community, didn’t qualify for the playoffs. Similarly, no Brazilian team made it to the group stage, most likely lowering the viewership of that stage.
Another popular team are G2, who won the entire thing and three of their series were among the top five most-watched ones in both 2022 and 2023, according to Esports Charts. Their grand final rival this year, Heroic, doesn’t seem to have that huge fanbase as well, at least compared to FaZe.
Moreover, the final happened on Super Bowl Sunday, which could have made some North American fans sway away from the competition to focus on the football game.
Related: CS:GO breaks 3-year-old player count record following the release of Revolution Case
The grand final of IEM Katowice 2023 itself was won by G2 Esports, who secured the trophy on the back of an incredible 21 map-win streak, the second-biggest in CS:GO’s history.
