The season-ending event for the League of Legends esports scene, the Worlds series, has consistently improved its peak viewership every year since 2020. At Worlds 2023, the grand final between T1 and Weibo Gaming reached 6.4M peak concurrent viewers, setting a new esports broadcasting record. We at Esports Charts have collated some factors which could affect 2024 reaching a new viewership peak, and present them.
Viewership dynamics heading into finals
Viewership increasing for the ultimate and final matches of a tournament seems logical, but this isn’t always the case, and the increase amount differs heavily from tournament to tournament. Since 2016, the Worlds series has seen peak viewership increase by anywhere from 25% to 165% heading from the last semifinals into the grand final.
Specifically in regard to last year, peak viewership at Worlds 2023 increased by 49%, and if we create a weighted average for the Worlds’ viewership dynamics, with the importance of data based on the raw number of grand final peak viewership, Worlds’ tournaments usually increase peak viewership by about 70% for finals.
The second semifinal of Worlds 2024 saw T1 face off against their Korean peer Gen.G Esports. This Korean derby semifinal reached 4.98M Peak Viewers, and based on Worlds 2023’s dynamics and our weighted average, this would statistically predict the finals of Worlds 2024 to easily break the current esports peak viewership record by about 1M viewers. Of course, this statistical dynamic is a superficial overview of the series’ performance, with other factors heavily affecting viewership.
Grand final participant’s viewership
The teams who make up the grand finals at an esports event are the key for whether the event will reach a high peak viewership. To get an idea of which teams would make the best finalists, we can analyse their average concurrent viewership for matches throughout Worlds 2024 before the finals. Critically, the Worlds 2024 finalists, T1 and Bilibili Gaming, have recorded some of the highest average viewership for Worlds finalists ever. Even excluding Chinese livestreaming platforms, Bilibili Gaming is still one of Worlds’ most popular finalists ever.
We cannot include Chinese livestreaming platform viewership statistics in our data due to the publicly available data of these platforms being unreliable and unfit for comparison with other livestreaming platforms.
Esports Charts PRO users can explore the top teams of Worlds 2024 by their average viewership for exact numbers, but roughly speaking, T1 reached well over 2.5M Average Viewers for their Worlds matches so far, and Bilibili Gaming fell short of 2M AV. This means T1 is the most popular Worlds finalist in League of Legends history, and Bilibili Gaming is also one of the top 5 Worlds finalists by pre-finals average viewership.
Even without accounting for Chinese livestreaming viewership, the Worlds 2024 final is shaping up to be one of the most popular events ever, considering the viewership of teams before the final match. One area which will be missed is the representation and activation of major regional audiences for League of Legends esports. Currently, while Korean fans will undoubtedly cheer for T1, all other major audiences will have no local team to support. With this in mind, let’s take a look at how the language segments have performed so far at Worlds 2024.
Size and dynamics of language segments at Worlds 2024
Comparing the peak viewership reached during Worlds 2023’s final to the current peak viewership reached during Worlds 2024’s semifinal, we can conclude there is still plenty of room for certain major audiences to grow. Korean viewership reached over 700K more concurrent viewers at peak in 2023, and English-language audiences more than 500K: these two top audiences for LoL esports still have room to grow for the final this year, with previous results outlining their potential.
Vietnamese and Brazilian LoL audiences have already actually increased their peak viewership compared to 2023. Vietnamese audiences for LoL esports are organically growing, and the audience is emerging as one of the newest major audiences for the MOBA title. In fact, 2024 could see Vietnamese audiences reach over 1M PV for the first time in esports history with the Worlds 2024 grand final. Brazilian audiences have been watching Worlds 2024 through the official CBLOL channels, and also the quickly-growing co-caster Bahia.
Spanish viewership, although previously a significant contributor to Worlds viewership, has seen its influence fall this year. The peak viewership for this audience in the finals will almost entirely depend on the riverwho has dominated all other Spanish-language channels throughout Worlds 2024. While Brazilian viewership has seen Baiano grow alongside the official broadcasting channels, ibai has seemingly dethroned the official Spanish-language channels, with him contributing 2/3rds of the total Spanish-language watch time at Worlds 2024 so far.
While Korean and English audiences still have room to grow in 2024, Vietnamese and Brazilian audiences are ahead of the curve, already increasing their peak viewership this year compared to 2023’s peaks. The viewership for Spanish fans will largely depend on ibai, and if this co-caster will cover the Worlds 2024 finals at all.
Effects of co-casting
Since co-casting was fully integrated into the Worlds broadcasting last year, these co-casters have entirely co-opted some of Worlds’ largest audiences, with fans deserting the official broadcasting channels. In 2023, this seemingly caused massive viewership drops for official channels in certain language audiences, but this has stabilised in 2024.
During Worlds 2023’s grand final, co-casters accounted for just over 20% of the total peak viewership. However, in 2024, co-casters are accountable for over 40% of the current peak, meaning their importance for Worlds viewership has roughly doubled. While relying on co-casters is not anything new to the esports industry, Worlds’ reliance on co-casters in 2024 could negatively affect the finals’ peak viewership, if these co-casters are not all present.
Timezones and scheduling of matches
The Worlds 2022 event was the least-watched Worlds since 2020, largely due to the event’s scheduling dissuading Asian fans from tuning in. The event was held in the Americas, with many playoffs matches in Mexico City beginning at 11pm Central European Time. While these late matches were not ideal for European fans, they were almost unwatchable for Asian ones.
For example, T1’s semifinal at Worlds 2022 against JD Gaming began at 7am for Korean fansand the match reached only 2.24M Peak Viewers. T1’s grand final match against DRX began a bit later, at 10am for Korean fans, and even this slight pushback helped the event to reach its ultimate 5.15M Peak Viewers.
Worlds 2024 is being held in Europe, which has historically proven to be ideal for League of Legends esports, as it marks a middle-point between many of LoL’s global audiences. The grand final between T1 and Bilibili Gaming will begin at 3pm Central European Time, or at 11pm for Korean fans. While fans from the Americas will be having their morning coffee right before worlds, Brazilian fans will largely enjoy the event beginning at midday.
TikTok emerging as a major esports livestreaming platform
Recently, video and livestreaming platform TikTok has been growing considerable in the esports broadcasting industry. Not only has TikTok been reaching hundreds of thousands of concurrent viewers for mobile gaming esports in Asia, it also recently set a new viewership record for traditional PC esports games during Worlds 2024.
Read also: Worlds 2024 semifinals touch new viewer mark, Caedrel leads co-casters’ charge
While the new record for TikTok in PC esports stood at only 135K concurrent viewersthis platform could still lead a minor but new audience to League of Legends esports. This record increased significantly from the previous TikTok record, which was 77K PV at the MSI 2024, meaning we could potentially see this record shattered once again during the grand final.
All in all, the factors we have considered in regard to Worlds 2024 finals viewership have painted a promising picture for the tournament. Statistically, the 2024 event should break records considering viewership dynamics of previous Worlds iterations, and many of the major language segments for its viewership have plenty more potential to reach during the final.
Keep an eye on the final between T1 and Bilibili Gaming, beginning on November 2 at 2pm GMT (click here to find the time in your own timezone). Our tournament page for Worlds 2024 will be live updating throughout the finals with some preliminary statistics, so keep an eye on the event breaking esports records, and potentially reaching 7M Peak Viewers.
