AoG Winter 2024 — Saigon Phantom maintains dominance as AIC 2024 looms

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On October 27, the Arena of Glory Winter 2024 — Vietnam's top professional Arena of Valor league — concluded at the Military Zone 7 Stadium in Ho Chi Minh City. While not breaking any records, it still attracted enough viewers to end as one of the most successful editions in the series.

The competition witnessed the top eight teams in the Southeast Asian nation battle it out for a total prize pool of $236,500. At the end of almost three months of action, Saigon Phantom beat One Star Esports 4:1 in the Grand Finals to emerge as the champion.

  Saigon Phantom has won the last seven Arena of Glory splits (Image via Saigon Phantom AOV on Facebook)   

The winner took home around $71,000 while the losing finalist became richer by about $39,500. The top five teams also qualified for the Arena of Valor International Championship 2024 and next year's season-opening split, with the sixth-placed side also sealing its spot in the 2025 event.

  AoG Winter 2024 – basic viewership stats and most popular matches   

The AoG Winter 2024 recorded 571.6K Peak Viewers during the Group Stage Week 6, Day 5 clash between Team Flash and Saigon Phantom. Interestingly, the Grand Final was only the fourth most popular game, with both the meetings between the above teams crossing 500K PV.

What helped so many pool stage games make the most popular matches list was the fact that this year, there was an extra group stage added to the format. That was also why the Arena of Glory Winter 2024 touched 25.2M Hours Watched and 113.6K Average Viewers over 222 hours of airtime, with the former figure being higher than what the spring split managed.

Moreover, Team Flash and Saigon Phantom are two of the most successful sides in the Arena of Glory series. In fact, the latter has won the last seven splits, with the former doing a four-peat between 2018 and 2020, so their rivalry and fight for bragging rights constantly brings in more viewers when compared to other match-ups.

It was also the seventh straight time that Saigon Phantom has faced off against the same opponent, One Star Esports, in the Grand Finals. The losing finalists' members had created the esports organization in February 2024 after splitting away from V Gaming, but the "curse of second place" has continued.

Impressively, TikTok continued its growth in the Vietnamese AoV market, increasing its share of the overall watch time at this Arena of Valor tournament by 66.8% from the Arena of Glory Spring 2024, with its peak concurrent viewership also shooting up by 21.3%.

  Most watched Arena of Glory competitions of all time   

As mentioned earlier, the Arena of Glory Winter 2024 ended as one of the series' most successful events. It finished as the second-most watched one after the 2022 edition while finishing in the third spot on the PV leaderboard. It also ended in the top five of the most-watched competitions in the game's long history.

  Most watched tournaments in Arena of Valor history   

Vietnam continues to show out as one of the fastest-growing and most crucial Asian languages in esports today. The latest Arena of Valor split was another example of the love and passion that fans from here have for competitive video gaming, and it will be interesting to see who these fans drive the viewership at the season-ending AIC 2024.