Big Games Machine: How gamers watch YouTube in 2025 in the USA
While the report is dedicated to YouTube, it shows the growing influence of TikTok as a platform for gamers.
The survey involved 1050 players from the USA who watch YouTube for more than 30 minutes per week. An equal number of men and women participated in the survey. For most respondents, mobile devices are the main platform (35%); PlayStation comes second (28%); Xbox is third; PC is fourth (13%).
Users have different genre preferences. The most popular genres among respondents are action (37%), puzzles (23%), sports games (23%), RPG, fighting games, simulators, and strategies (19% each).
The survey showed that young people watch YouTube the most. 45% of respondents watch 1-3 hours of gaming streams on the platform per week. 16% spend more than 4 hours watching gaming streams.
The most popular categories among users are guides or tutorials (47%), reviews (40%), and compilations of funny or cool moments from games (40%).
Users aged 18 to 24 are 2.5 times more likely to watch "Let's Play" videos than players aged 45-55.
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Compilations of funny/cool moments are more popular among the female audience. Men, on the other hand, are twice as likely to watch esports videos.
21% of respondents mainly watch only streamers who create content for games or genres they're familiar with. The majority of respondents watch diverse streamers producing different types of content.
The survey also showed that men are slightly more interested in gaming news and reviews, as well as esports competitions, than women. Women, in turn, are more likely to watch VTubers.
When choosing a content creator, people rely on the type of content or genre the person works in (49%). For 45%, the creator's personality is important, 40% look at the quality of videos, 36% pay attention to how well the creator plays. Reputation (34%) and relatability (33%) are also important.
Audience size, as it turned out, is not very important to people. Most people indicated they prefer to watch medium-sized creators (from 100 thousand to a million subscribers) and micro-influencers (from 10 to 100 thousand subscribers).
Small channels are equally popular among both casual YouTube audiences (those who watch gaming content less than 2 hours a week) and YouTube enthusiasts.
Large YouTube channels are generally more popular among fans of action and sports games. This might be because these genres typically have a wider audience, making it easier to gain subscribers.
8 out of 10 gamers watch live streams. Among the audience aged 18 to 24, it's 9 out of 10.
As the survey showed, people of all genres like to watch streams. Though, they are least popular among players of puzzles, simulators, and strategies.
The influence of TikTok as a platform for watching gaming content is increasing. TikTok has closely approached Twitch (a platform specializing in this) in terms of popularity.
46% of people who named PlayStation as their main platform watch live game broadcasts on TikTok. The platform is also popular among the female audience - 41% said they watch live broadcasts there.