What would an excellent esports tier listing appear like?

Similar to sports activities followers arguing if Rugby or American soccer is more durable, everyone in esports has a unique opinion on which title is one of the best. This has led to followers making their very own tier lists the place they rank main esports — nonetheless one factor these normally have in frequent is bias. Whether or not unconscious or not, it’s troublesome to be goal when rating something, until there are outlined parameters.

So what would make an ultimate tier listing? Esports Insider seemed on the statistics and put collectively some key standards that could be thought of in an excellent, extra objectively-defined tier listing. The 4 classes we based mostly our tier lists on are present (2023) viewership, all-time viewership, prize swimming pools, and longevity. Primarily based on these 4 rankings we made one closing tier listing to find out what these statistics say are probably the most well-rounded esport scenes.

In these tier lists the next video games can be ranked: League of Legends, Counter-Strike, Dota, Cellular Legends: Bang Bang, Rainbow Six Siege, VALORANT, Enviornment of Valor, PUBG Cellular, Fortnite, Apex Legends, Free Hearth, Rocket League, Name of Responsibility, EA Sports activities FC, Overwatch, Halo and Starcraft.

Within the first class we ranked every esports title by way of modern viewership. This determines how effectively the sport did over the previous yr by trying on the peak viewership of its hottest occasion in 2023.

It’s no shock that League of Legends dominates this listing because the World Championship broke the esports viewership document with an impressive peak viewership of over 6m, which is 2m greater than Cellular Legend: Bang Bang sitting in second place, and quadruple CS:GO’s peak which sits in third.

It’s much more spectacular while you have in mind that every one viewership knowledge for this listing is taken from Esports Charts, which doesn’t monitor Chinese language platforms as a result of problem of acquiring correct Chinese language knowledge. Nonetheless, you will need to word that this class can be disproportionately weighted in opposition to scenes with bigger Chinese language viewerbases, comparable to League of Legends, Enviornment of Valor and others. There isn’t a clear efficient methodology to get round this problem in the mean time.

Counter-Strike’s lack of look within the S-tier could also be on account of the truth that Valve has but to run a Main event on CS2. Valve made the choice to solely have one Main in 2023 in order that the professional scene may adapt to its new sport earlier than the subsequent Main, which can now happen in March 2024.

On the prime of this listing additionally sits Cellular Legends: Bang Bang which has seen an enormous improve in development during the last 4 years. In 2019 the height viewership for the sport sat simply above 600,000, whereas this yr the M4 World Championship had a peak viewership of over 4 million.

On the decrease finish of this tier listing is Rainbow Six Siege. Ubisoft’s sport sits in D after it struggled with viewership this yr, as its second Main of 2023 grew to become the least common within the sport’s historical past. It’s much more shocking contemplating it ranks a lot increased in one of many different metrics listed beneath.

The second class is peak viewership, the place we’ve got mixed the highest ten occasions on this title’s historical past based mostly on their peak viewership. This gives a extra correct depiction of which esports titles have persistently carried out effectively throughout quite a few key occasions through the years. 

The height viewership listing is considerably just like the earlier class, nonetheless, the stark distinction is Free Hearth has jumped up from B to A. This follows a development of video games which have had their viewership peaks lately outperforming video games with viewership peaks earlier than the 2020s.

A key instance of that is Fortnite which had a peak of two.3m in 2019, however solely ranks within the C tier on this listing whereas VALORANT, with a peak of 1.5m in 2022, is ranked in B. 

Older video games comparable to CS and League of Legends retain their ranks on the very prime while one other previous sport in Starcraft finds itself in F with lower than one million peak viewership while you add the sport’s 10 hottest occasions collectively.

The third class is sorted by prize pool. These statistics are sourced from Esports Charts which mixes each prize pool from that title to get one total determine. This ends in esport titles which have had persistently massive prize swimming pools for a few years discovering their solution to the highest of the listing. 

On the very prime sits Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2 which have had massive prize swimming pools of their premier occasions for a few years. These prize swimming pools lineup with their viewership numbers that are additionally very excessive, not like Fortnite which has struggled comparatively by way of viewership, however on this listing they be part of the 2 esport giants in S tier. 

As talked about earlier Rainbow Six Siege excels on this class in comparison with the title’s viewership numbers, because it sees itself within the B tier alongside Rocket League and one other youthful esport, VALORANT.

This class sees cell video games a lot additional down the tier listing than viewership. One purpose for this could be that cell esports has accessed a really totally different market than PC gaming. With out the necessity for an costly pc there’s a widened entry for cell esports as anybody with a smartphone can take part.

The opposite facet of this coin is that the common income per buyer for a cell esports occasion goes to be a lot decrease, and prize swimming pools are according to that. This alongside the truth that they don’t have the longevity required to have amassed a large enough assortment of enormous prize swimming pools places them a lot decrease down, for instance Cellular Legends: Bang Bang sits in D tier and Free Hearth in C.

The one exception to this rule is Enviornment of Valor; regardless of not recording the height viewership numbers of its cell sport counterparts, it outshines them within the prize pool division sitting comfortably within the A tier.

Apparently, a sport that has struggled in each different class, however completed effectively right here is Starcraft which sits in B tier.

The final class is longevity, which takes a have a look at how lengthy the esports scene of every title has been lively. For this part Esports Insider has taken the date of the primary recorded notable esports event from every sport and ranked them accordingly. It’s price noting that we’ve got taken the earliest version of the online game franchise; for instance the listing consists of the primary Counter-Strike event versus the primary CS2 event. 

Notably, a number of the video games that discover themselves within the S tier right here have struggled in each different class. For instance, Starcraft 2 dates its historical past in esports again to 2003, but presently finds itself in F tier for present viewership. In distinction, nonetheless, Counter-Strike is among the oldest video games on the listing, being launched in 2000, however has been in a position to stay related to at the present time — amassing an enormous prize pool over its historical past and persevering with to host wildly common tournaments.

PUBG Cellular finds itself on the backside of the D tier alongside Enviornment of Valor, however regardless of this they’ve each ranked in A tier for prize pool. So regardless of their brief historical past they’ve seen unimaginable funding of their tournaments. The other of that is Halo which has loved an extended historical past in esports, however by no means fairly amassed a big prize pool to match. 

Regardless of a few of these video games having such a younger lifespan, a lot of them have excelled within the different classes offered comparable to VALORANT, Fortnite, and lots of the Cellular video games listed.

Esports Insider has calculated the common place of each esports title throughout the 4 tier lists to find out the place they stand relative to one another. After the common place of every title throughout all tier lists was taken under consideration, listed below are the ultimate standings.

Quite predictably, Counter-Strike and League of Legends come out on prime with Dota shut behind. The cell video games fill out the center alongside newcomers Fortnite and VALORANT, while on the opposite finish Halo’s one look within the S tier propels it out of the F tier. The 2 video games sitting within the backside tier are Overwatch and Rainbow Six Siege, regardless of the latter having one B tier look.