LCS hit hardest as LoL esports viewership slides across all major leagues

The League of Legends esports viewership numbers are finally in after the delayed wrap-up of Europe’s LEC yesterday, and they don’t paint a pretty picture of the state of the game—particularly in North America.

Across the board, League viewership is down both this recent summer split and the year as a whole according to stats site Esports Charts. Despite the boost in broadcast hours thanks to its new format, the LEC saw a seven percent drop in average viewership and over 80,000 fewer concurrents for the summer split final compared to 2022’s edition.

While not as drastic of a fall, LCK also saw a slight drop in average viewers in the summer—approximately five percent. However, plenty more tuned in for the Gen.G-versus-T1 rematch in this split final: Over 200,000 more people watched Gen.G hold off T1 to claim the LCK championship. Given the huge viewership drop when Faker was rested due to injury, to say a single player was responsible for the fall in LCK viewership isn’t that far-fetched.

The same could not be said for North America’s offering this year. The LCS saw a shock 30 percent drop in average viewers in just five months, recording 76,889 concurrents on average across the split as a whole. This pales in comparison to the six-digit numbers recorded during the spring split in April and summer 2022.

In fact, the 2023 LCS summer split recorded the fewest average viewership in over six years of records on Esports Charts—a worrying sign for the health of the scene.

The community has speculated on what has caused this sharp drop in LCS viewership. The shift to weekday matches in the early afternoon, as opposed to playing on weekends, was sure to leave a mark on who could tune in to watch. Riot opted to open the weekend up for VALORANT’s VCT Americas season, pushing the LCS to the midweek.

With both League and VALORANT making use of the same arena, having both play out over the weekend was not a feasible option, with Riot deciding to shift the LCS to Thursday and Friday.

The impact on the esport at large will be evident come October’s World Championship in South Korea. Many cited a drop in interest in regional leagues and instead favored tuning in for MSI and Worlds, where they can watch the very best teams compete for the pinnacle of League.