Sami Shafiq
February saw quite a few popular tournaments come to an end, while a few more kicked off, including some that got their esports seasons going. Many popular disciplines had events that took place across the second month of the year, including Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, CS:GO, Valorant, League of Legends, and Call of Duty.
With so many events happening, there were bound to be names that attracted more viewers than others. What is undoubted is that the usual suspects maintained their ability to churn out high audience numbers, with the top game from January continuing its reign atop the overall chart in February as well.
Esports Charts has crunched the numbers to break down the viewership statistics and pick out the most popular esports tournaments from February.
MLBB events continue to reign supreme
An MLBB competition led last month’s list of most popular tournaments after also heading the rankings in January. The MPL Indonesia Season 11 registered 1.7 million Peak Viewers during the RRQ and EVOS Legends match, with Indonesian turning out to be the main language with 1.3 million PV.
Most popular events overall by Peak Viewers
The second most preferred event was the VCT 2023: LOCK//IN São Paulo, which registered 883K PV during the match pitting NRG and LOUD against each other. Surprisingly, Portuguese was the second most popular language with 312K PV, despite the fact that FPS titles are highly sought-after by Brazilian audiences.
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The IEM Katowice 2023 came in third as it turned out to be a sleeper hit for CS:GO in February, notching 726K PV during the Grand Finals between G2 Esports and Heroic. Perhaps the fact that the former was chasing a first title at the event after three previous losses in the finals — two to Natus Vincere and one to FaZe Clan — brought in more eager viewers, who were not disappointed as G2 finally broke their duck to clinch the title.
Fans of League of Legends who were beginning to think that their favorite game would somehow not make this list need not worry, for the following two entries are from this Riot Games offering. The LCK Spring 2023 was the fourth-most preferred competition last month, with 715K PV achieved during the meeting between T1 and Gen.G. These two teams were also the most popular in terms of HW and Average Viewers, meaning their match from Week 2 Day 4 was always going to be up there in terms of the most concurrent viewers.
Finishing in fifth was the LEC Winter 2023, which notched a PV of 572K during the G2 versus MAD Lions Playoffs Grand Finals. Spanish and French would have been happy campers after this event — which was the first to be held in the revamped format for the European, Middle East, and North African (EMEA) regions — as they saw increases in their viewership shares.
CS:GO audiences lead English-only stats
Most popular events in English by Peak Viewers
When it comes to ranking the most popular tournaments based on English-speaking viewers, the IEM Katowice 2023 came out on top, registering 443K PV. This number was notched during the February 12 game between G2 and Heroic, as the language took a massive 62.3% of the total HW share during the entire competition.
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Coming in second place was the VCT 2023: LOCK//IN São Paulo for its 426K PV during the match between Sentinels and Fnatic. Both teams have massive followings in their respective European and American regions, so it would have been a surprise if their series did not make it near the top of this leaderboard.
The MPL Indonesia Season 11 was third on this list of English viewers, doing 418K PV for the series between RRQ and EVOS Legends. Again, these were two of the most-watched organizations in terms of HW and AV across the event, so their places at the top of the PV charts for the tournament would not have raised too many eyebrows.
Fourth was the LEC Winter 2023, thanks to a peak concurrent viewership number of 326K for the bout that pitted G2 and MAD Lions against each other. English did much better overall in terms of AV from the two splits held in 2022, proving to the organizers that despite the latest season’s new rules and regulations, fans are all in when it comes to the action unfolding before their eyes.
The Call of Duty League 2023: Stage 2 Major rounded off the top five after putting up 300K PV, which was accomplished during the Elimination Round 4 match-up between Los Angeles Thieves and OpTic Texas. English ended up being the only language that fans of this competition preferred, as the other languages barely moved the needle in terms of PV numbers.
Author: Ravi Iyer
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