The series of RMR events for the PGL Copenhagen 2024 Major was the most-watched RMR cycle ever
As we covered throughout the event, the recent PGL Major Copenhagen 2024 European RMRs (A, B, and Decider), were the most-watched series of regional RMRs in Counter-Strike’s history. Now that the American RMR concluded on March 5, we can look at the viewership received by all regional events.
The RMR B tournament for Europe became the most-watched singular RMR event ever, with 8.84M Hours Watched. Although no other tournament in this series of RMRs could beat this, other regions enjoyed growth compared to previous RMRs for the region.
Viewership of individual RMR events for the PGL Major Copenhagen 2024
Team Spirit’s matches were by far the most-watched games of the RMR B tournament, and they set the overall Peak Viewership record for this round of RMRs during their match against MOUZ. This match also became the second-most popular RMR match in Counter-Strike’s history.
Read also: European RMRs hit best viewership thanks to donk’s domineering popularity
The American RMR garnered 4.02M Hours Watched and generated 251.6K Peak Viewers for the match between Complexity Gaming and FURIA Esports. Complexity Gaming might not be the discipline's most established North American esports organisation, but they consistently draw high viewership at RMR events. Across the last three RMR cycles, PGL Copenhagen 2024, BLAST.tv Paris 2023, and IEM Rio 2022, Complexity have featured in the most popular match of the American RMR.
FURIA also received high viewership for each match, largely thanks to the support of Brazilian Counter-Strike broadcaster Gaules. The Brazilian streamer generated a majority of the event’s watch time by himself, and effectively single-handily made Portuguese the most popular language of the event. Apropos of Gaules’ viewership being determined Portuguese, there is no difference made between Brazilian-Portuguese and Portuguese in the statistics we receive from Twitch’s API.
7 Brazilian-majority teams competed at the American RMR, and 4 out of the 5 teams to qualify for the PGL Copenhagen Major were Brazilian-majority. However, despite the strong performance of Brazil, only FURIA received high viewership. Imperial Esports, paiN Gaming, and Legacy are all Brazilian rosters who qualified for the Major but they were unable to rank within the tournament’s top 5 most popular teams, despite gaules’ support and competitive success.
Lastly, the Asia-Pacific RMR received 475.5K Hours Watched and 36.2K Peak Viewers for the lower bracket final between China’s Lynn Vision Gaming and Australia’s Grayhound Gaming. Compared to the previous Asia-Pacific RMR event, average concurrent viewership was on the rise, although the tournament’s ultimate Peak Viewers figure was not as high as last year’s.
Mongolian-language viewership remains a driving force behind the Asia-Pacific region and The MongolZ have qualified for their second Major tournament in a row. Mongolia is quickly becoming an esports hub for Asia, and The MongolZ are currently looking like Asia’s strongest team after defeating Lynn Vision in a one-sided 2-0 match for the Upper Bracket Final of the event.
Although Mongolian viewership is strong, the English-speaking Australian demographic is a sizeable portion of Counter-Strike viewership that will be unrepresented at the upcoming Copenhagen Major. Grayhound Gaming’s match against Lynn Vision was the most popular of the event with a noticeable spike in English-language viewership, however, Grayhound will not be attending the Major after losing to Lynn Vision. Even more disappointingly for Australian fans, on March 3 the organisation announced they are ceasing operations and releasing their players.
Total viewership for the PGL Copenhagen Major’s RMRs compared to the previous cycle’s
When the viewership of all RMR events is totalled, the recent PGL Major Copenhagen RMRs were the most-watched RMRs ever for Counter-Strike and marked an 18.2% increase in watch time compared to the previous cycle of RMRs for the BLAST.tv Paris Major. The RMRs managed such a significant increase in watch time despite a 14.6% drop in Airtime.
The PGL Major Copenhagen RMRs garnered 22.1M Hours Watched in total. Not only is this significantly more than the 18.7M HW received by the previous cycle’s events, but it is also more than the 21.8M Hours Watched garnered by RMR events of the IEM Rio Major 2022, which was previously the most-watched series of in-house RMR tournaments.
The Road to Rio RMR events still hold the record for the most concurrent viewers watching an RMR match thanks to the game between Complexity Gaming and Imperial Esports (that featured FalleN at the time) at the Road to Rio 2022 American RMR, which received 486.6K Peak Viewers.
The recent PGL Major Copenhagen RMRs’ viewership spells good fortunes for the upcoming Major tournament. The PGL Major Stockholm 2021 is currently Counter-Strike’s most-watched Major ever, at 71.27M Hours Watched. This is the current bar for the most-watched Counter-Strike Major, and the upcoming Copenhagen event may be able to compete.
Considering the hype around the upcoming event, Copenhagen Major may be able to become the most-watched Major event ever and dethrone the Swedish Major. Since the PGL Major Stockholm 2021 broke the 70M Hours Watched barrier in 2021, no other tournament has been able to achieve the same, although some have come close. Now, a second tournament from PGL might be able to achieve the same feat as they managed in 2021.
The PGL Major Copenhagen 2024 begins on March 17 with a 16-team Swiss format. Some of the most popular teams in Counter-Strike will be in attendance: FaZe Clan, Team Vitality, Team Spirit, NAVI, G2 Esports, Team Liquid, Heroic, FURIA Esports, and many more. Follow the event page throughout the opening stages and keep an eye on the viewership for the Major, it might be one of the most-watched Counter-Strike tournaments ever.
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