SuperData: F2P Titles Brought In 87% Of All "MMO" Gaming Revenue in 2016, Made $21.1 Billion

SuperData's 2016 gaming year in review is now available for free on the market research firm's website. And it's got some pretty staggering claims that, while seeming outlandish at first, make sense -- from a certain point of view.

On the top of page 9 of the report is the headline "Free-to-play MMOs have 92% of the MMO market players and generate 87% of the revenue," with a total of $21.1 billion in revenue. That had us scratching our heads a bit. I mean, sure there are a lot of Free MMOs out there, but are World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy XIV that insignificant?

As usual, SuperData is very liberal with its definition of "MMO." mixes "MMO" and "MOBA" elsewhere on the page as it refers to Dota 2 and League of Legends under the headline "Free MMOs continue to dominate the eSports world while earning themselves increasing exposure." The middle paragraph talks about MOBAs, however, as a separate category. I'd imagine "Free MMO" includes pretty much anything we'd cover here on MMOBomb.

In that context, taking big MOBAs and games that aren't big in NA/EU but are in other regions, like Dungeon Fighter Challenge and Crossfire, I could see the 92%/87% numbers as legit. Obviously, this total wouldn't include primarily single-player games that did big business in 2016, like The Witcher 3 or Fallout 4.

Some other interesting F2P-related numbers to digest in SuperData's report:

The report's got a lot more on mobile games (Pokémon Go was large), e-sports, Twitch/YouTube viewership, VR, and console games, so if numbers are your thing, give it a download and check it out for yourself.