A third of China’s population plays mobile games

A third of China’s enormous population plays mobile games. That’s 459 million people in all -- approximately as many as the populations of the United States and Japan combined.

That’s according to a new report from China’s Game Publishing Committee and Gamma Data, which laid out the state of play for gaming in China in the first half of 2018.

We visualized the report’s findings, breaking down China’s enormous number of gamers in five simple graphics.

In the first half of 2018, China’s gaming industry earned US$15.4 billion in revenue (RMB$105 billion).

60% came from mobile games, 30% from “client” games (think PC and console) and only 6.9% from web games. The number of mobile gamers is growing rapidly, while client gamers are flat and web gamers are quickly declining.

Esports are huge in China, and revenue from mobile esports games was up 27.9% to US$33 billion in the first half of 2018 -- led by MOBA games.

MOBA explained: One of the most popular genres in esports is making a push on mobile

MOBA games accounted for just 8.3% of the highest grossing mobile games in China… but they account for almost half of all esports revenue.

Among the 10 highest-grossing Chinese games, one name stands out: Arena of Valor, also known as Honor of Kings in China. It’s the only game to make the top 10 in both the domestic and overseas lists.

Arena of Valor, China’s mobile League of Legends, is aiming to be the world’s go-to mobile esport

Unsurprisingly, Chinese gamers prefer games made with local themes. Two of the most popular games on the list are based on the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West.

The domestic list is dominated by games from Tencent and NetEase, which have five games each on the top ten. But it’s a different story outside China: Games published by smaller companies enjoyed greater success.