The Epic Games Store had a big announcement today, revealing that it will allow game developers to self-publish their titles on Epic"s storefront for the first time. However, that"s not the only thing that was revealed today. The company published its Epic Games Store year in review for 2022, and it has some interesting stats on the store, along with some upcoming features for 2023.
Here are some of the highlights
- The Epic Games Store had 230 million users in 2022, up from 194 million in 2021.
- There were 34.3 million daily active users in 2022, and 68 million monthly active users, up from 62 million in 2021.
- Epic Games Store gave away 99 games in 2022 that were normally worth a total of $2,240. Over 700 million free game downloads were made in 2022, and Epic pledges to continue offering free games in 2023.
- 626 new games were added to the store in 2022, for a total of 1,548 games in the store"s library. That total will likely grow a lot more with the new self-publishing support.
- Epic Games Store users spent $355 million on third party applications in 2022, up 18 percent from 2021. If you add revenue from Epic"s games like Fortnite and Rocket League, that total comes to $820 million, which is actually down 2 percent compared to the year before.
Epic also revealed its top games in the store for 2022, based on "player spent and engagement" While it didn"t offer any hard numbers on that front, it said that the top five games on the service are Genshin Impact, Rocket League, Tiny Tina"s Wonderlands, Grand Theft Auto V, and of course Fortnite.
In 2023, Epic Games says the store will add features like Content Hubs for publishers to offer more info on their games beyond the simple product pages. It will also add support for games with subscription services. The Epic Games Store launcher will get improvements as well, including faster launch times, this year.