ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 Viewership Statistics

The ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023, one of the major tournaments in Mobile Legends: Bang Bang esports circuit, ended in Jakarta on November 19. The championship, held just days before the start of the main championship for the discipline, recorded the second-lowest Peak Viewers number in the series' history.

The MPL Invitational is an international tournament featuring the best teams from Southeast Asia, as well as invited participants from other regions. This competition was originally held online before the world championship, and it usually takes place before it. This year, the event was held offline for the first time, marking an important milestone for the series.

“This year's MPLI marked many firsts - the tournament welcomed the participation of international teams from China, North America, the Middle East and North Africa, and featured offline play. ONE Esports MPLI 2023 places top three in hours watched and average minute audience among its predecessors, underscoring the tournament's impact on the global MLBB and esports scene.”

Jane Guo, VP Analytics & Insights, ONE Esports

Unfortunately, ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 didn't manage to reach new viewership heights, and probably the biggest reason for it is the not-the-best performance of Indonesian teams. First off, ONIC Esports, the MPL Indonesia Season 12 winners, decided to withdraw from the tournament because of schedule conflicts and the desire to give their players a break. Secondly, the majority of participants from MPL Indonesia did not even manage to pass the Group Stage. Given that Indonesian was the #1 language for the tournament broadcasts, this affected viewers' interest in the competition as a whole.

Finally, the Grand Final featured two representatives from the Philippines — ECHO and RSG Philippines. The latter secured a 3:1 victory and claimed $37K. This marks RSG Philippines' second championship title in international tournaments, with its first victory over RRQ Hoshi in the MLBB Southeast Asia Cup 2022 final.

ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 viewership results

The matches of the ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 accumulated 8.4 million Hours Watched. The Average Viewers number per broadcast amounted to 165.1K people. The series between ECHO and HomeBois on the first day of the playoffs, which attracted 573.6K Peak Viewers, became the most popular match of the tournament. RSG Philippines amassed the most Hours Watched at the event, although it did not make it into the Top 5 by Average Viewers.

The matches of the ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 were broadcast on 174 Unique Channels, including official studio channels and streams from community casters. The highest number of Hours Watched was accumulated by streams on YouTube.

Comparison of ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 with previous tournaments

Most popular MPLI tournaments by Peak Viewers

The ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 became one of the least popular tournaments in the series in terms of Peak Viewers, it attracted 18.5% fewer viewers than the last year’s event. The leader in this aspect remains the ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2021, which had 1.73 million Peak Viewers. This is three times more than the last tournament in Jakarta.

Overall, the ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 did not even make it into the Top 10 most popular Mobile Legends tournaments in 2023. It was surpassed by the IESF World Championship 2023, the first international tournament of the discipline held outside of Southeast Asia.

2023 edition ranked 3rd by watch time & concurrent viewership

Apart from the poor performance of Indonesian teams, another reason for the low audience engagement at the ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2023 is its proximity to the M5 World Championship. Previously, there was usually a gap of about a month between these tournaments, but this year, it was only four days.

From November 23 to December 17, Moonton will host the M5 World Championship, the premier tournament of the year in the professional Mobile Legends scene. Twenty-two teams from around the world will compete for a prize pool of $900K. The previous tournament, the M4 World Championship, attracted 4.2 million Peak Viewers and became the most popular in the history of the discipline.