Intel: there are 711 million PC gamers in the world

According to Intel, there are currently 711 million PC gamers in the world, which works out as one in every ten people on the planet. In addition, the desktop is “alive and well” with innovation thriving in all form factors.

[NovusTerminus]

Intel, leave the math to your processors. Loading Facebook games doesn't count. There are allot of PC gamers out there, but counting every PC as a gamer can't be right.

[na-no-nai]

Cant that also be said about mobile phone users but apparently the mobile phones are killing dedicated handheld markets. Just saying

[extermin8or]

Just because apple claims they are killing handheld gaming by counting every iphone etc as a gaming device doesn't mean this is the case. The actual handheld gaming market really hasn't changed all that much in size. People don;t buy a phone just to play games the fact it cn play some games is a plus. People buy a 3DS or vita etc just to buy games hence they are items that count for handheld gaming market and 3DS has a similar sized install base to its predecessors at this point in their life cycle.

[Magicite]

By gamers they mean PC users who are able to play certain games? Or people who have dedicated gaming rigs and spend money on retail or digital games?

[kevnb]

It all counts, otherwise while we are at it why don't we stop counting people who only play call of duty

[FsterThnFTL]

Sounds about right. But how many of them have PCs better than a PS4 or an Xbox One is the bigger question, those are the real PC Gamers.

[RamboRabbi]

Real PC gamers just play on PC rather than any other platform, hardware specs have little to do with PC gaming as a whole. The majority of PC gamers play games like LoL, Starcraft, Dota and CS on mid end hardware due to them not being able to afford a high end rig so stating that only people with hardware specs better than the next gen consoles are true PC gamers is very naive. PC elitist trolls are what give the impression that everybody can afford high end rigs when in actual fact "real PC gamers" play on what they can afford.

[boneso82]

I agree with most of what you said RamboRabbi but...

To say the "majority" of PC gamers play games like LoL, Starcraft, Dota and CS, is just as naive as thinking all PC owners are PC gamers or all PC gamers own rigs that are better than PS4/XBONE.

Just to let you know "majority" means more than half...

[GundalfDeGrej]

You don't need a PC more powerful than a console in order to be a "real" PC gamer. Some of the most played games out there aren't that demanding. Take Dota 2 or CS:GO for example.

Edit: Rambo beat me to it :)

I'd say steam stats is the best way to show how big PC gaming really is. This Sunday there were close to 7.5 million users online at the same time and it's pretty safe to say that all of these people are PC gamers.

[Dante81]

Mid-range PCs are not astronomically expensive, breh, and they blow away both consoles. Still, this number is definitely padded by the unwashed MOBA masses.

[kingduqc]

A shit ton would be the correct number. Go look hoe many gpu amd and nvidia sell each quarter. It's about the total next gen console base. Not all those are faster but 80% of their gpu lineup is...

[700p]

Anyone that plays any type of game on a pc..is a pc gamer.

[jeeves86]

I think I would label this as 'one in every 10 people owns a pc powerful enough to game on.' Which doesn't really say much, considering that there are some insanely popular games whose specs don't require a lot of horsepower. Talking about more than just browser games, too.

[--bienio--]

Thats a lot good!!;)

[Metallox]

Well, I would think that a good portion of that quantity is on platforms like Facebook, they don't buy games that are available in Steam, for example.

[LightofDarkness]

I think they recently said about 20% of PC gamers are in the hardcore/lightcore demographics. They are your enthusiasts with decent PCs and such. 711 would be about 80% casual gamers, mostly comprised of females as well. The 20% of hard/light core gamers are heavily male dominated, apparently.

[traumadisaster]

"They said" are you serious...get a source

[LightofDarkness]

It's a NPD report on gamers:

http://www.engadget.com/201...

[boneso82]

Even if it is 20%, that is still about 144 million gamers that are considered "hardcore" and have rigs better than a next gen console.

How many next gen consoles have been sold now? about 15 million? This reminds me of a very commonly used warning sign... "MIND THE GAP"

[starchild]

Exactly. I've tried to point this out before. Add up all the sales of every graphics card from both Nvidia and AMD, especially those at about a GTX 660 level or higher, and you would easily have tens of millions of PC gamers with at least decently powerful rigs that outperform the consoles. And of course this number is only going to go up as each new lineup of graphics cards is released each year.

[kevnb]

Why do you think they are mostly women? Do you think all men game on high end pcs and/or consoles?

[LightofDarkness]

Please refer to my reply further up, the NPD numbers of gamer demographics show that is mostly the case.

[CLOUD1983]

I wonder how many are going to left if we exclude all those who play facebook & browser games lol...

[Funantic1]

Microsoft has something to do with most of those 711 million PCs.

[Stoppokingme]

There's a big difference between playing a game on PC and being a PC gamer.

That number would be more than halved if the survey was more refined-I don't play PC much anymore because my laptop is an ancient relic so I should be excluded from that list, and so should those who occasionally play facebook or browser games.

Intel have been generous with those figures and if they were readjusted to only include the people who are consistent/Hardcore PC gamers then their figures would be lucky to make 200 million.

[asmith2306]

I'm one of them. I'm playing Solitaire right now.

[bednet]

But But but, PC gaming is dying, I learned that on N4G! /s

"Intel’s Broadwell CPUs will bring Iris Pro graphics to socketed processors, which will compete directly with AMD’s APUs, allowing for super small gaming builds with capable on-board graphics."

In other words, Intel's next gen CPUs will bring gaming capabilities to most PCs without having to fuss with a dedicated GPU.

[DeadlyFire]

True, but also it acts as a multiplier with a dedicated GPU. Well for AMD anyway. Not sure on Intel's end. Integrated graphics are a bare minimum. They are not even as strong as PS4/XB1 graphics yet, but can hold up semi decently.

[uth11]

That's a lot of Candy Crush!

Seriously though, the sales of AAA games don't come close to reflecting an install base that large.

So either that's a lot of piracy, or the hardcore PC game population isn't that large.

[starchild]

Do you realize how many PC games there are? Each year there are greatly more games released on PC than on any other platform. Not to mention the PC is backwards compatible and many older games are still available to be purchased and played. THAT is a huge amount of games for sales to be spread out among.

Many of you make the mistake of looking at the occasional sales numbers for particular console-centric games on PC and assume that because the games in question saw lower sales on PC than on console it must mean that games sales on PC are lower in general.

The fact is, we don't have reliable sales data for the vast majority of games on PC, most of which are sold in digital form, but we do know that there are a massive number of developers who make games for the PC and see success on the platform. If this weren't so, support for the PC would be drying up, when in fact PC game development is only increasing.

[hello12]

Taking a break from my console. Total war Rome 2 Empire edition released today on Steam. Lots of new features and graphical upgrades. Best thing it was given for free for people who bought Rome 2 last year.