What can we expect from the esports industry in 2025?

From LAN parties held late at night between teenage buddies to the multi-billion-dollar industry and its representation at the Olympics, multiplayer games and the esports industry as a whole have come a long way. While in the past, popular multiplayer games adapted to the challenges of their concurrent digital environment and tried to improvise and find the best solutions to organising and conducting tournaments, determining the best players in the world for every popular game, in 2025, we can confidently state that things have changed. The infrastructure adapts to meet the growing needs of the esports market. 

Streaming services and hosts across the globe bid and negotiate for rights to host or represent not just a discipline, like LoL or CS2, but every single team, their game sessions, training regimens, and merchandise. Not to mention the astonishing prize funds for the largest esports competitions, rivaling those of more conventional sports and, more often than not, exceeding them. All these factors demonstrate that in 2025 and beyond, the industry will continue to grow and expand. We will analyse the key factors driving this growth and make several predictions about the key changes expected in the esports business later this year, which are listed below in our article.

Industry titans stay strong and won't face any additional competition in 2025

Despite many new players trying to find their way into the esports circuit, key games, or "disciplines," remain the same for a few years, with a few notable exceptions. The most popular competitive games in the world include:

• League of Legends, or LoL. As far as esports statistics go, LoL has remained on top of the esports industry since its inception in 2009 and has no plans of relinquishing the title of the most popular competitive videogame in the world shortly. With 130+ million monthly players and 1,5 million people following their largest tournaments, this title from Riot Games reigns supreme.

• Dota 2. Despite comprising only a fraction of the player base, measuring in the hundreds of thousands, not the hundreds of millions, Dota 2 remains the biggest competitor to LoL within the same 5x5 MOBA genre. Besides, thanks to the support of its parent company, Valve, the owner of the largest videogame digital store on the planet, Steam, Dota 2 successfully marketed their tournaments to the same level as LoL has, reaching the same 1,5 million viewers for their biggest last year's competition, The International 2024.

• Valorant. The most popular first-person shooter, Valorant, was developed by Riot Games and is famous for League of Legends. With its 18 million monthly players and 1,3 million viewers for its biggest competition, it comes dangerously close to dethroning MOBA games as the esports industry's biggest sensation.

• Counter-Strike 2, or CS2. The Original Counter-Strike, in its many iterations, was one of the first popular esports games, and CS2 from Valve continues the tradition. With 1.8 million players and viewership for tournaments just shy of one million, CS2, released only in 2023, is one of the best representatives of the esports industry growth.

• Fortnite is a gaming sensation known for its competitive multiplayer (with 2.6 million viewers, FNCS was the most popular gaming event of 2024), availability on virtually all devices—not just PCs and gaming consoles but mobile phones, and metaverse-style integrations with regular virtual concerts and events. Fortnite surprises its audience and industry analytics each year—let's see what they have in store in 2025.

How esports turns into an official sports discipline: olympics and betting

As of 2025, esports is on a rapid track to becoming an official sports discipline. Popular sports franchises, such as Bayern, PSG, FC Barcelona, and Manchester City, are actively registering their esports brands, participating in the transfer market, and creating teams ready to tackle the competition in both sports simulators (such as EA FC) and more traditional esports competitions, like LoL and Dota 2. Starting in 2027, the Olympic Committee plans to introduce esports as an official Olympic discipline. However, it is still not yet clear which disciplines these Olympic tournaments will adhere – sports games, MOBAs, first-person shooters, or all of them?

It doesn't stop many concurrent players, viewers, and bettors from perceiving esports as not just official but simply a sport. Sports betting sites, including MelBet, allow players to bet on their favourite esports teams in the most popular tournaments held for each and every popular esports discipline. The market share for these esports bets comes dangerously close to the combined revenue of traditional sports betting, which makes the consideration of integrating into the esports scene from both the biggest sports franchises in the world and an Olympic committee quite obvious.

Key trends: mobile gaming, artificial intelligence, and virtual reality

In 2025, we anticipate the industry will adapt to modern technological discoveries and tendencies to integrate them seamlessly into its operations. The most significant and most essential current trends in esports include:

• Mobile gaming is the hottest thing in the gaming industry, period. Previously considered an activity for casuals and non-serious gamers, mobile gaming has changed significantly from these earlier years, with tournaments attracting astonishing audiences and featuring millions of dollars in prize pools becoming the norm. Expect it to play an even bigger role in the current year, perhaps moving some of the more traditional games from their thrones.

• Artificial intelligence is the hottest new invention, and everyone is trying to get a hold of it. A few people are as successful as esports teams. AI is already being integrated into training procedures, analysing opponents' teams, repeating exercises according to the proposed tactics, and more. The first company to introduce an esports-focused AI might make millions on integration with the industry.

• Virtual Reality, on the other hand, still needs to establish itself, but it is highly anticipated as part of esports equipment. As more people purchase attractive and affordable headsets, we expect VR to be more frequently used as a training platform and a meta-verse arena for following games.