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E-sports An Alternative Future for Televised Sports?

Alistair Taylor, Karol Severin, Mark Mulligan, Tim Mulligan and Zach Fuller
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The 20,000 foot view:  E-sports continue to gain attention, with more brands seeking to enter the space populated as it is by a succession of new leagues, competitions and teams. But for all the hype, e-sports has not yet managed to deliver the scale of audience that the market activity warrants. This does not mean that e-sports will fail to meet expectations, but rather that the path to success may differ from that being currently followed. Traditional sports may feel little meaningful threat in the near term, but as Gen Z ages, they may find distinctions between televised sports and watching gamers play increasingly irrelevant.

Key findings:

               of consumers attend e-sports events, a figure that varies little by market and that has been relatively flat since            2016
  • The            of            that watch games videos represent            addressable market for e-sports
  • Gaming video            are to gaming what televised            are to live sports
  • E-sports need            build an organic base of            event communities to drive longer-term            of larger events
  • A key            is how e-sports will perform            a live sport compared to           
  • IOC president            Bach rejected e-sports’ consideration for            Olympics in September 2018
  • As Gen            games fans age, current delineations            televised sports and e-sports will            less

Companies and brands mentioned in this report: Amazon, Audi, AT+T, BBC, Caffeine, Coca Cola, eNations Cup, ESPN, FIFA, Fortnite, Geico, Google, FIFA, IOC, Live Nation, McLaren, NBA, NBA            League, Ninja, Stadia, Sky, The Olympics, Tfue, The World Series, Twitch, Visa, YouTube