Why E-Sports?

The answer to the question ‘why esports?’ is simple – it makes tons of money. Its growing popularity makes esports one of the fastest growing entertainment industries in the world. Here we will take a brief look at statistics that make the gaming scene so lucrative.

According to esportsearnings.com,  the total prize money rewarded to e-sports players has accumulated to over $291 million. There are 35,349 players in 21,048 tournaments. The highest earning player has earned over $2.7 million playing DOTA 2. The largest prize pool in one tournament was from The International 2016 LoL tournament at over $20 million.

Outside of the small probability of becoming a top professional player, the amount of viewership is already surging past several mainstream sports. The LoL championship got more views than Game 7 of the NBA Finals. More people watched an e-sports tournament than the World Series.

A study done by newzoo showed that e-sports audience will grow by 40% by 2020. Global e-sports attention will reach 1.8 billion people by the same time. Numbers like this support why several big name investors are taking a gamble on the growing e-sports scene.