This web page was created programmatically, to learn the article in its authentic location you’ll be able to go to the hyperlink bellow:
https://www.windowscentral.com/gaming/pc-gaming/epic-games-store-grew-from-108m-to-295m-users-but-third-party-revenue-barely-moved
and if you wish to take away this text from our web site please contact us
Epic Games Store simply posted huge progress numbers — leaping from 108 million customers in 2019 to 295 million in 2024. But right here’s the catch: third‑celebration income solely grew 1.6% in the identical interval, according to a post on Reddit.
The purpose? Epic leaned so laborious into free sport giveaways that it skilled hundreds of thousands of customers to log in, declare freebies, and by no means spend a dime.
Online discourse be damned (particularly on Reddit); the Epic Games Store has come beneath scrutiny in latest days as customers evaluate its progress between 2019 and 2024. During that interval, the platform grew by 173%, rising from 108 million customers to greater than 295 million.
The Epic Game Store problem
For those that have no idea, the Epic Games Store is Epic’s reply to Steam, Valve’s PC storefront that dominates the market. Steam is the go-to platform for many PC gamers, partly as a result of it merely works and doesn’t get in the best way of the person expertise.
Steam was not at all times that manner. When it first launched within the early 2000s, it confronted heavy criticism, however that may be a story for an additional time.
The Epic Games Store launched in 2018 and instantly tried to take market share from Steam by providing builders a greater income break up and by locking down unique releases. That method did little to win over gamers, and Epic has since moved away from it, however does nonetheless present a greater income break up.
I would like you guys to know how deceptive the numbers are.This is Epic Games customers, which might successfully simply imply accounts created, a quantity that may be artificially inflated to “sound big.” (pic 1)This is totally in contrast to Steam’s concurrent participant depend, which presents… pic.twitter.com/3Ptkzxbo0oJanuary 8, 2026
Instead, Epic leaned closely into free video games to convey customers onto the platform. While that technique labored when it comes to sign-ups, it additionally turned the shop into a spot many individuals solely open to say giveaways earlier than closing it once more, which is one thing I additionally do.
It is straightforward to level and snort at Epic right here, however the platform does, or at the least did, provide a worse total expertise than Steam in nearly each manner. It launched with out many fundamental options, and whereas it has spent years filling in these gaps, for some customers, it has all come too late.
For instance, Epic solely added opinions in 2022, wishlists in 2021, achievements in 2021, gifting in 2025, and messaging in 2025 after eradicating them 4 years in the past. It nonetheless doesn’t provide household sharing or mod help, and that is just some issues; the record goes on.
Is this an Xbox PC drawback as properly?
It is straightforward to attract some parallels between the Epic Games Store and Xbox PC. Both are competing with Steam, and each lack options by comparability, however that’s largely the place the similarities finish.
While it’s simple to be cynical about Microslop, the Xbox app relies heavily on subscriptions through Game Pass rather than giveaways. PC Game Pass has seen 45% year over year growth, which shows that even with its feature gaps, there is an engaged audience willing to spend money rather than just opening the app to claim free games and leave.
While this is not directly tied to Xbox PC, console players also show a strong willingness to spend, especially on shooter titles. Even though PlayStation is estimated to outsell Xbox hardware by roughly 3 to 1, Xbox users still turn out in large numbers to buy certain games, which you can read more about here.
Unlike Epic, Xbox can also be investing closely in a cross-device ecosystem throughout cloud, console, and PC. The long-term purpose is for future Xbox {hardware} to blur the road between console and PC, bringing Xbox and Steam libraries collectively in a single place. That imaginative and prescient is what retains me within the Xbox ecosystem, because it presents a extra open and versatile future than a closed platform that merely repeats the identical cycle every technology.
The way forward for PC gaming is Steam for now
Unfortunately for Xbox and Epic, PC users have had it very good for a long time with Steam. Its user-focused approach and stable feature set mean it has not given players many reasons to leave, which is likely why both Xbox and Epic now seem more focused on carving out their own lanes rather than trying to directly replace it.
In Xbox’s case, the next generation of hardware is expected to support multiple storefronts, including Steam and Epic. For Epic, it has taken a different route by allowing things that Steam does not, such as NFT-based games, and by publicly supporting the use of AI in development. Tim Sweeney (Epic’s CEO) has also criticised Steam for requiring developers to disclose AI usage.
What as soon as felt like an area the place Epic and Xbox couldn’t exist now seems like one the place coexistence is feasible, and that’s high-quality. While neither platform is prone to take significant market share from Steam, neither of them must with the intention to succeed on PC.
That actuality is mirrored in how I take advantage of it. I nonetheless open the Epic Games Store to say free video games, whereas spending most of my time working by my Steam and Xbox backlog, usually forgetting Epic is even there. That doesn’t make Epic a failure, particularly because it brought in over $1.09B in revenue in 2024. By comparability, Steam pulled in $1.6 billion in December alone. While Epic could by no means attain the identical scale or goodwill as Steam, it doesn’t have to with the intention to stay profitable.
For many, Epic has grow to be the “free game launcher” relatively than an actual storefront. Steam stays the place folks truly purchase and play, whereas Epic’s technique left it with hole progress. Whether you see this as intelligent advertising or a failed experiment, one factor is evident: Epic taught its viewers to not often open their wallets.
Do you utilize Epic Games Store and if that’s the case, how? Let us know by commenting and collaborating in our ballot beneath:
Follow Windows Central on Google News to maintain our newest information, insights, and options on the high of your feeds!
This web page was created programmatically, to learn the article in its authentic location you’ll be able to go to the hyperlink bellow:
https://www.windowscentral.com/gaming/pc-gaming/epic-games-store-grew-from-108m-to-295m-users-but-third-party-revenue-barely-moved
and if you wish to take away this text from our web site please contact us
