Last year, the eSports market experienced a tremendous growth. In addition to the steady increase of the amount of eSports enthusiasts all over the world this growth is reflected by record-breaking viewership numbers, new dimensions of prize money and investments into the millions. Reason enough for us to look back on 2015 and sum up a few of the most interesting numbers.

This article features:

eSports events with the highest amount of unique viewers in 2015

eSports events with the highest amount of peak concurrent viewers in 2015

eSports events with the highest amount of visitors on site in 2015

Investments and buyouts in the eSports market in 2015

eSports clubs with the highest prize money winnings in 2015

eSports players with the highest prize money winnings in 2015

Total awarded prize money ordered by eSports game in 2015

eSports events with the highest amount of unique viewers

Event Game Unique viewers Worlds 2015 League of Legends 36,000,000 Source ESL One Cologne 2015 CS:GO 27,000,000 Source DreamHack Cluj 2015 CS:GO 25,090,864 Source ESL One Katowice 2015 CS:GO 8,780,000 Source Gfinity Championship Series 2015 CS:GO 8,750,000 Source WoT World Championship 2015 World of Tanks 2,600,000 Source ESL Championship (Spring) 2015 multiple 1,055,840 Source Smite World Championship 2015 Smite > 1,000,000 Source Red Bull Gaming Ground 2015 Dota2 500,000 Source The Main 2015 League of Legends 310,000 Source

eSports events with the highest amount of peak CCU

Event Game Peak Concurrent Viewers Worlds 2015 League of Legends 14,000,000 Source The International 2015 Dota2 4,606,264* Source IEM Katowice 2015 League of Legends 2,600,000 Source ESL One Cologne 2015 CS:GO 1,300,000 Source ESL One Katowice 2015 CS:GO 1,012,745 Source ESL One Frankfurt 2015 Dota2 1,000,000 Source DreamHack Cluj 2015 CS:GO 985.052 Source

* There is no official data regarding the International 2015 (TI5), but we have received a lot of feedback which criticizes TI5 not being on the list. We have received a source which shows that the final match had at least 4,606,264 viewers at a certain time. Therefore we added it, but we cannot be sure if this is the official amount of peak concurrent viewers.

eSports events with the highest amount of visitors on site in 2015

Event Game Visitors on site IEM Katowice Multiple 104,000 Source ESL One Frankfurt 2015 (Commerzbank Arena) Dota2 30,000 Source LCS Final NA 2015 (Madison Square Garden, NY) League of Legends 22,000 Source ESL One Cologne 2015 (LANXESS Arena) CS:GO 22,000 Source LCS Final EU 2015 (Hovet Arena, Stockholm) League of Legends 20,000 Source The International 2015 (KeyArena, Seattle) Dota2 > 17,000* Source Worlds 2015 Final (Mercedes-Benz Arena, Berlin) League of Legends 13,000 Source

* There is no official data regarding the International 2015 (TI5), but we have received a lot of feedback which criticizes TI5 not being on the list. Therefore we added it. The tournament lasted six days and took place in the KeyArena in Seattle which has a total seating capacity of over 17,000. Since the final day of the tournament was sold out it is safe to assume that it had more than 17.000 visitors on site, but at this moment we cannot provide any additional and profound data.

Investments and buyouts in the eSports market in 2015

Investor/Buyer Company Investment USM Holdings Virtus.pro $ 100,000,000 Source Modern Times Group Turtle Entertainment GmbH $ 84,987,000 Source Activision Blizzard Major League Gaming $ 46,000,000 Source Riot Games Curse $ 30,000,000 Source Index Ventures and more Super Evil Megacorp $ 26,000,000 Source Modern Times Group DreamHack $ 25,000,000 Source FanDuel AlphaDraft < $ 25,000,000 Source Universal Music Group and more Vulcun $ 12,000,000 Source Binary Capital, Mark Cuban and more Unikrn $ 10,000,000 Source March Capital Partners and more Dojo Madness $ 2,260,700 Source

Clubs with the highest prize money winnings in 2015

Club Prize money won Evil Geniuses $8,958,225 Source CDEC Gaming $3,295,931 Source LGD Gaming $3,226,494 Source Vici Gaming $2,624,702 Source Team Secret $2,231,114 Source Virtus.pro $2,157,685 Source COGnitive Gaming $1,768,958 Source EHOME $1,627,431 Source SK Telecom T1 $1,531,484 Source Cloud9 $1,469,200 Source

Players with the highest prize money winnings in 2015

Player Game Prize money won Peter Dager (ppd) Dota2 $1,730,076 Source Saahil Arora (UNiVeRsE) Dota2 $1,730,076 Source Clinton Loomis (Fear) Dota2 $1,730,076 Source Sumail Hassan (SumaiL) Dota2 $1,730,076 Source Kurtis Ling (Aui_2000) Dota2 $1,641,750 Source Sun, Zheng (Agressif) Dota2 $651,470 Source Liu, Xinzhou (garder) Dota2 $651,470 Source Fu, Bin (Q) Dota2 $651,470 Source Chen, Zezhi (Xz) Dota2 $644,622 Source Huang, Jiwei (Shiki) Dota2 $644,622 Source

Total awarded prize money ordered by eSports game in 2015

Game Awarded prize money Dota 2 $31,015,892 Source League of Legends $7,639,121 Source Counter-Strike: Global Offensive $6,177,015 Source Smite $3,648,508 Source StarCraft II $2,806,310 Source Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare $2,471,347 Source Heroes of the Storm $2,410,690 Source Hearthstone: Heroes of WarCraft $2,355,140 Source Heroes of Newerth $755,546 Source Ultra Street Fighter IV $559,346 Source

// Image source: eslgaming.com / Photograph: Patrick Strack

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