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'Grand Theft Auto 5' Is The Most-Watched Game On Twitch, Eight Years Later

'Grand Theft Auto 5' Is The Most-Watched Game On Twitch, Eight Years Later

The game has beaten out the likes of League of Legends and Fortnite to claim the title

Catherine Lewis

Catherine Lewis

Here we go, more year in review stats! We love to see it. Each year’s Twitch stats are always fun to look at - it’s interesting to see what games were the most engaging amongst viewers, as well as how many people have been actively using the platform in the first place. Well, these stats, courtesy of Rainmaker.gg and StreamElements' State of the Stream 2021 year in review, have revealed an unlikely winner for the most-viewed game of the year.

As you probably already gathered from the headline, it’s GTA V! For years, League of Legends has been the uncontested winner, only being dethroned this year, and also back in 2018 by Fortnite. LoL was still one of the most-watched games this year, albeit not the winner. The other most-watched games (in no particular order) were Fortnite, Minecraft, Call of Duty: Warzone, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Valorant, Dota 2, and Apex Legends.

While you're here, be sure to check out some of our favourite GTA V wins and fails below.

So, what’s brought people back to GTA V? It’s probably a lot to do with the comeback of roleplaying, specifically on the NoPixel server. GTA RP has been a thing since 2013, but some popular changes to the NoPixel server have been bringing players flocking back. Roleplaying can be a ton of fun - earlier this year, we saw the likes of the Undertaker and Wario causing havoc in Los Santos, which is as funny to watch as it is to actually play. 

I definitely don’t need to tell you that Twitch isn’t just gaming anymore, and this year’s stats have proved that. The overall most-watched category was Just Chatting, which, even if you’re unfamiliar with the platform, I’m sure I don’t need to explain. 

One final Twitch statistic for your troubles - overall viewership increased massively this year, by a whopping 1.3 billion hours of watch time. That makes the total watch time this year 2.1 billion hours, up from 764 million last year. The pandemic has really done a number on us, huh? Hopefully next year that number might actually be a bit lower, if that’s indicative of anything.

Featured Image Credit: Rockstar Games, Twitch

Topics: GTA 5, GTA Online, Twitch