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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsWorld of Warcraft reaches 12 million players
by Adam Holisky 
Oct 7th 2010 at 10:33AM
That's a lot of Deadmines runs.
VanerasToday we announced that World of Warcraft has passed another major milestone and now hosts more than 12 million current subscribers around the globe. Check out the press release for the full announcement, and thank you to all of our players for making this possible -- we're grateful for all of the support and enthusiasm you've shown over the years, and look forward to continuing to provide you with great entertainment experiences for a long time to come.
For those wondering exactly what constitutes a subscriber, check after the break. Otherwise, know that Blizzard has pretty strict accounting practices, and this number isn't blown up by some cheap trick.
Blizzard PRWorld of Warcraft subscribers include individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft, as well as those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access. Internet Game Room players who have accessed the game over the last thirty days are also counted as subscribers. The above definition excludes all players under free promotional subscriptions, expired or cancelled subscriptions, and expired prepaid cards. Subscribers in licensees' territories are defined along the same rules.
Filed under: News items
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 7)
RogueJedi86 Oct 7th 2010 1:03PM
I don't think it's $180 million a month since the Chinese players don't pay by the month, and instead by the hour/minute. You'll still end up being close to $100 million or higher, but it's not going to be the full $180 mill unless every Chinese player plays the equivalent of a monthly fee in hourly playtime.
Darky Oct 7th 2010 10:52AM
And I've heard people claim WoW numbers were dwindling *chortle*.
Pat Oct 7th 2010 11:06AM
They've been claiming that since a month after release. My favorite was when subscriptions first hit 1 million (a phenomenal number for an MMO) and people were whining that WoW was actually losing more subscribers than they were gaining. Because that makes mathematical sense.
Helston Oct 7th 2010 11:52AM
You should listen to them, I hear they're pretty good at detecting these things.
relmatos Oct 7th 2010 12:56PM
Yes. It's clear that Wotlk has killed WoW and that Cataclysm will kill it even more :P
Since people have been claiming that everyone would leave WoW to go to Aion, Conan and all the other MMOs, I'm guessing those MMOs have more than 12 million subscribers each.
The Dewd Oct 7th 2010 5:26PM
They're probably only dwindling in terms of not screaming skyward through the roof like they were before. (i.e. They just aren't growing _as_fast_ as they were before.)
It'll probably still be a while before their numbers plateau or drop off - especially where they always have new content in the pipeline. As many have said before, it'll probably take a new MMO from Blizzard to kick WoW off the throne.
The Dewd Oct 7th 2010 10:55AM
Somebody should pull up all the old announcements and graph it out visual for the rest of us so we can see what the growth looks like, visually.
mingdi9 Oct 7th 2010 11:05AM
Here:
http://users.telenet.be/mmodata/Charts/Subs-1.png
From http://mmodata.net/
clundgren Oct 7th 2010 11:13AM
Thanks for the link, but that chart looks pretty sketchy. There is one data point that is obviously inaccurate, and it has WoW hitting 12 million last year and slowly declining since, which today's announcement clearly invalidates.
Noselacri Oct 7th 2010 11:16AM
This graph confuses me. Where did 5 MILLION accounts go for a month?
Rakah Oct 7th 2010 11:14AM
look at that huge dip 1/2 way through 2009-2010
Corv Oct 7th 2010 11:15AM
That was because of the problems in China - there was no WOW in China for some months. That's all.
Darasen Oct 7th 2010 11:19AM
The dip in WoW numbers is likely from the issues they had in China.
mingdi9 Oct 7th 2010 11:23AM
Here's the chart for just WoW, which shows the dip is because of a drop in subs in the east:
http://users.telenet.be/mmodata/Charts/WoW.png
If you think his numbers are wrong, you can probably dig around his site or ask him directly.
The Dewd Oct 7th 2010 11:28AM
Thanks mingdi9.
I'm guessing that trough is the time period between when The9 was no longer running WoW in China but before the Chinese rerolled on Taiwanese servers? (Sounds like, statistically, it's not really relevant since it's a hiccup caused by business and politics and not so much by growth or lack thereof.)
Noselacri Oct 7th 2010 11:29AM
0 data for EU and NA after 2008?
Incomplete graph isn't finished and feels inaccurate. :(
fabriciomind Oct 7th 2010 11:51AM
@Noselacri
Haven't you noticed that they were grouped into west and east? And that means that were not anymore computed separately?
For me seems to be pretty realistic.
Hank Oct 7th 2010 10:55AM
I'm curious as to how many are US subscribers.
And it's not that Blizzard has strict accounting practices; their parent company is publicly-traded Activision (ATVI), and as such has to comply with strict regulations enforced by the SEC in the wake of the Enron/Network Associates/Worldcom accounting scandals.
Doanld Oct 7th 2010 10:55AM
plus another $80,000,000 for the new 1 million accounts/subcribers
Allen Oct 7th 2010 10:58AM
180 million dollars a month and they can't even get Curse of Elements to fall off when you leave an arena match.
180 million dollars a month and they can't come up with a battleground people enjoy.
180 million dollars a month and they can't come up with a way to balance shaman and paladins in Arena.
180 million dollars a month and they have to steal ideas off a World of Ming blog.