The Electronic Entertainment Expo, which took place earlier this month in Los Angeles, was a tremendous success for a lot of game companies. However, it was also big for the streaming channel Twitch, which provided a lot of live coverage from the event over its three day span. We previously reported that it drew big numbers, with up to 700,000 to 800,000 concurrent viewers for the pre-show press conferences alone.
However, since then, the company has released more official results from its coverage, per the included infographic below.
According to the data provided, over 21 million unique viewers tuned in to the event in one form or another, with up to 840,000 concurrent viewers at given points in their broadcasts. This is 16 times more than the actual attendees for the E3 event, which reached more than 50,000.
In addition, nearly 12 million hours of content from the show was watched overall, either live or through rebroadcasts. According to Twitch, that’s the amount of time for a person to travel to Pluto and back, an estimated 72 times.
Twitch broadcast 41 hours of live E3 content, including eight press conferences and 85 gaming segments. Out of those segments, 11 were exclusive to Twitch, giving people a reason to tune in. Twitch has turned into an enormous marketing booster for E3 and for the exhibiting companies, amplifying their messages and engaging millions more consumers than previous media coverage of the event.
Partners to the Twitch program around the world also benefitted from E3 coverage. Co-streaming support was at an all-time high during the show, with just over 1,800 unique channels participating with rebroadcasts in German, French and Dutch. They made up 35 percent of total E3 viewership overall, indicating that the show has a popular following overseas, just as much as it does in the U.S. gaming community.
Finally, as a participating partner in Twitch’s coverage, Humble Bundle offered a special “E3 Digital Ticket” program, enabling users to not only watch programming, but also obtain exclusive goodies, including games and other items. The partnership turned out to be a huge success, as more than 174,000 bundles were sold, raising $390,000 for charity.
Even with the competition from YouTube with its recently announced Gaming channel, Twitch had no problem dominating E3. And with other big video game events around the corner — including PAX Prime in August and Gamescom later in the year — there’s no stopping its momentum.
