IEM Rio Major 2022 Challengers Stage Viewership Records

The night of November 4 marked the end of the first stage of IEM Rio Major 2022, following which all the teams to take part in the second group stage of the event were determined. While most of the Brazilian teams failed to please their fans, the championship managed to set several series records within the Challengers Stage.

The last teams to take part in the Legends stage were determined on the final game day of the Challengers Stage. In the first match, OG lost dramatically to Team Vitality with a score of 1:2 and was eliminated from the tournament. In the second series, Cloud9 made a comeback on the first map against GamerLegion and eventually ended the series in its favor (2:0) — the Russian team made it to the next stage, despite having started the tournament with two losses and being one step away from elimination. In the last match, Fnatic confidently dealt with the South American team 9z — which means that the club will take part in the main group stage of the Major for the first time in four years.

Over the five gaming days, the tournament amassed 22.2M Hours Watched and attracted 455.5K Average Viewers. IEM Rio Major 2022 got off to a very confident start: according to these metrics, the championship in Brazil surpassed the corresponding stage of PGL Major Antwerp 2022 by 15% and 1%, respectively.

The Peak Viewers mark was reached on the very first gaming day and amounted to 751.5K viewers, of which the majority (698.2K Peak Viewers) followed the match of Imperial (team of Brazilian CS:GO legend Gabriel FalleN Toledo) versus Team Vitality. The first stage of the major surpassed the previous tournament of the series by 6% in terms of Peak Viewers. It should be noted that the most popular match of the Challengers Stage at the last major also featured Imperial.

Challengers Stage at IEM Rio Major 2022 has made great strides in terms of viewership statistics. The event showed the best Average and Peak Viewers results in five years. The Brazilian tournament was slightly behind only FACEIT Major London 2018 by Hours Watched, and this is due to the fact that IEM Rio Major was on the air for 25% less time.

LIVE statistics and broadcasts of IEM Rio Major 2022

In addition, IEM Rio Major 2022 set other records as part of the Challengers Stage. For example, this applies to the Peak Viewers on Twitch, which amounted to 657K viewers. This is the best result on the platform among other CS:GO majors considering only Challengers Stage. The previous record of the stage was set during the respective stage of PGL Major Antwerp 2022 and amounted to 587.3K.

The current tournament has also updated its records of the stage across multiple broadcast languages. For example, the French streams attracted 25.8K Peak Viewers. This is 27.7% more than the previous result recorded during the Challengers Stage at StarLadder Major Berlin 2019. This increase is due to the interest of French viewers in the matches of Team Vitality: the local team is considered one of the world’s strongest, but at the Brazilian Major it was nearly eliminated already during the Challengers Stage.

A Peak Viewers record was also set by the Mongolian language: the Challengers Stage broadcast at IEM Rio Major 2022 was watched by 15K Peak Viewers (up 2.5% from the previous record during PGL Major Antwerp 2022). The Mongolian fans were primarily interested in the performance of the IHC Esports team. It failed to qualify for the Legends Stage, but the Mongolian team scored a sensational victory over the Brazilian team 00 Nation, which is represented by two-time major champions TACO and coldzera.

To get access to advanced analytics for IEM Rio Major 2022 and other esports events, subscribe to Esports Charts with PRO subscription. It will allow you to find out about the top-5 most popular teams of the tournament, check the peak viewership by platforms and broadcast languages, as well as get access to other metrics.

Speaking of other languages, the Rio tournament also set new broadcast records in Serbian, Tagalog, Romanian, and Ukrainian within the Challengers Stage. A special mention goes to Gaules and the figures of the Portuguese broadcast. So far, it looks like IEM Rio Major 2022 will be a high point for Brazil's most popular CS:GO streamer. The personal channel of Gaules outperformed even the official English-language broadcasts from ESL by Peak Viewers and Hours Watched.

Thanks to Gaules, the Portuguese broadcast reached 380K Peak Viewers and surpassed all other languages by this indicator. Falling behind by 15% and coming in second was English. Portuguese broadcasts accounted for 35.3% of the total Hours Watched, making this the second-best result after the English broadcast (46%).

Gaules / photo: twitter.com/Gaules

Naturally, the most popular teams of the Challengers Stage were the Brazilian ones. The highest number of viewers gathered at the matches of Imperial Esports: a total of 509K Average Viewers. 00 Nation and FURIA Esports scored 11% less and entered the top 3. The top 5 in terms of popularity also featured Team Vitality and 9z.

Interestingly, of all of the above, only FURIA Esports and Team Vitality were able to get through the Challengers Stage. Now they will have to compete in the Legends Stage against the world’s top teams, which means that there will definitely be changes in the ranking of teams.

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November 5 will mark the start of the Legends Stage matches, in which 16 of the world’s strongest teams will take part: FaZe Clan, Natus Vincere, Ninjas in Pajamas, Heroic, and other teams. They will determine eight participants who will continue to fight in the playoff bracket for a total prize pool of $1.25M.