Dota 2 reaches 1M concurrent players, reclaims spot as most played game on Steam
The increase can be attributed to the rise in popularity of custom game Dota Auto Chess.
Dota 2 has reached over 1 million concurrent players — its first time since February 2017 — to reclaim its spot as the most played game on Steam.
Dota 2 breaking 1,000,000 concurrent users in 2019, what a time to be alive.pic.twitter.com/vid2SWiGnr
— Matthew Bailey (@Cyborgmatt)July 08, 2025
Dota 2’s player count has been on the rise since the year started. According toSteamCharts, the game peaked at over 874,000 players in January and at just under 965,000 players in February.
Dota 2 has now ousted PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) from Steam’s top spot, as the battle royale game peaked at just over 931 thousand players in February perSteamCharts. PUBG has been bleeding players since its all-time peak of over 3.2 million players on Steam in January 2018 — largely because of the popularity of rival battle royale titles such as Fortnite: Battle Royale and the recently-released Apex Legends.
Dota 2’s professional scene remains healthy as well, with successful tournaments inESL One KatowiceandMDL Macauin February. March is also looking to be a busy month for the game’s competitive scene, with DreamLeague Season 11, StarLadder Minor, and WESG coming up.
What would most likely lead to even more players for Dota 2 is the impending release of its newest hero — Mars. During the release of the 7.21 balance update back in January, Valve said that they are looking to release the newest hero by early March.
The new ranked season is coming next week, and alongside it a balance focused 7.21 patch. We are aiming to release Mars sometime between the end of February and early March.
— DOTA 2 (@DOTA2)May 13, 2025
We can expect Mars to come out by next week, that is if the calendar for his release is not on the notorious “Valve time“. In any case, Dota 2’s already rising player numbers seem set to go up even more soon.
