PUBG Continental Series 5: Viewership Breakdown

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The fifth edition of the PUBG Continental Series, the premier PUBG esports online competition held by PUBG Corporation, has concluded recently with the series of regional Grand Finals — the last stop on the path to PUBG Global Championship 2021.

The series consisted of four tournaments for Europe, Americas, Asia and Asia Pacific regions with a total of $1 million in prize money. Each of the events featured 16 teams competing for a share of their respective $250,000 prize pool and a spot at the Global Championship 2021. 

In terms of viewership, PUBG Continental Series 5 (PCS5) was rather comparable to its previous editions, with numbers varying based on the region. To get a better insight into the event’s performance, we collected viewership statistics of each of the regional competitions, analyzed them and compared them with previous events within the series. Here’s the regional breakdown of PCS5.

Asia Pacific

When it comes to the popularity of PUBG Continental Series 5, the one region that markedly exceeded the remaining three by all viewership metrics is Asia Pacific. In 28 hours of Air Time, the PCS5 APAC garnered 2.36M Hours Watched, which is 165% more than the following Asian event. Its peak of 140K concurrent viewers, which occurred in Round 10 during the third week of the tournament, exceeded the second highest peak of PCS5 by 170%. On average, 83.6K viewers tuned in.

Moreover, the PCS5 APAC event reached the highest numbers since the launch of the series in all three viewership metrics, which makes it the best performing event of the PUBG Continental Series so far. The event was won by Vietnamese team BN United. 

Compared to the previous season of the series, the viewership of PCS5 APAC more than doubled, with the numbers indicating a 122% increase in HW, 143% increase in PV and 131% increase in AV.

Asia 

On the contrary, the Asian tournament, which was won by Chinese team Petrichor Road, marked a notable viewership decrease, placing itself as the worst-performing PCS Asia event by AV and PV, as well as the second worst-performing PCS Asia event by HW, after its inaugural season. 

During 29 hours of Air Time, the PCS5 Asia gathered over 891.7K Hours Watched, showing a 19% decrease in viewership compared to the previous season. The event peaked at 51.9K concurrent viewers, which is a 9% decrease compared to PCS4 Asia. On average, 31.2K viewers watched the competition, marking a 12% decrease in AV. 

Europe 

Just like PCS5 Asia, the European competition has also shown a slight decrease in viewership, placing itself as the worst-performing PCS Europe event by HW and PV. 

In 31 hours of Air Time, the PCS5 Europe gathered 656.3K Hours Watched, showing a 25% decrease in viewership compared to the previous season. The event attracted 32.7K Peak Viewers and 21.2K Average Viewers — 44% and 32% decrease compared to PCS4 Europe, respectively. The winners of the event — Russian team Virtus.pro — have defended their victory from PCS4 Europe. Note that the community casting popular in Europe. Tournament matches are regularly covered by popular streamers and former players of the discipline (makataO, POKAMOLODOY, MuMiNo and others), many gather over a thousand spectators.

Although the PCS5 Europe ended up fairly behind the APAC and Asia, the viewership difference during the previous seasons wasn’t nearly as big. In fact, Europe’s results were comparable to said regions and even surpassed them on a few occasions.

Americas 

The North and South American regions are not the strongest when it comes to the popularity of PUBG esports, which has been reflected in viewership results since the launch of the series. Starting from PCS4, slots for LATAM teams have been added into the NA’s division, which ended up boosting the region’s viewership by a few thousands of viewers. 

The PS5 Americas, won by Oath Gaming, accumulated 415.8K Hours Watched, peaking at 21.3K concurrent viewers. On average, 12.9K viewers spectated the competition. 

The numbers of the last two PCS Americas events were rather similar, only the Peak Viewers indicator showed a noticeable difference — a 19% increase in concurrent viewers compared to the PCS4.

The presented statistics clearly show Asia Pacific as the region leading in PUBG Continental Series viewership, having garnered the highest amount of Hours Watched in each of the five seasons of the series. As for HW and AV indicators — the first place was in all cases occupied either by APAC or the Asian region. Based on these results, it’s evident that PUBG esports sees the highest popularity in Southeast Asia and Oceania. 

The culmination of the PUBG 2021 Competitive season — PUBG Global Championship 2021 is set to take place from November 19th to December 19th in Paradise City in Incheon, South Korea. The competition will see 32 of the world’s best PUBG teams fighting for a share of the $2 million prize pool and a prestigious title of 2021 PUBG global champions. For detailed statistics from the event, be sure to check out our viewership overview once the competition concludes.