The Indian online gaming sector is soaring exponentially being currently valued at $1.8 billion and it is expected to reach US$ 4-5 billion by 2025 according to the EY – AIGF report. Moreover, online gamers in India are estimated to grow from 360 million in 2020 to 510 million in 2022. Currently, there are over 400 gaming start-ups at present that are accelerating the growth of the sector.

As per the report by KPMG, the online casual gaming industry in FY 2021 is valued at INR 60 billion and the market is anticipated to grow more as casual gaming is penetrating the real money gaming market as well.

When COVID-19 brough traditional sports events in India to a grinding halt, the esports & gaming industry came to rescue people from the blues and offered virtual entertainment. The spike in online gaming majorly can be attributed to the rise in the young population, increased use of smartphones, easy availability and accessibility of technology and internet, rising investment by capitalists, and appropriate distribution network. Publishers like Garena, Riot, Krafton etc are actively involved in investing and growing Esports in India. Here’s how the year fared for platforms, organisations and brands and their upcoming plans for the year 2022:

With the rise of online gaming sector over the past year, the ecosystem has indeed witnessed a transformation in terms of legislation and best practices. While the KPMG report says there are 420 million casual games users, 92 million RMG card and casual based users, 60 million RMG card and fantasy sports users, ‘India Gaming Report 2021’ by Lumikai and Redseer reports that there were 80 million gamers in 2020. It also surmises that paid gamers will be driving further growth as paid gamers in India are set to approximately become 235 million in 2025.

World Cricket Championship 3 (WCC 3), recently dropped its latest update, ‘Road to Glory’ featuring multiple language commentaries voiced by former cricketers and professional commentators to cater to more diverse geographies in 2022. Three new commentators, Anjum Chopra for Hindi, Vijay Bharadwaj for Kannada and Deep Dasgupta for Bengali will be joining the roster of the already existing panel. 

Esports industry is soaring high both in terms of viewership and revenue. Many esports organisations have sprung up over the past year, contributing to its upward trajectory. One such esports organisation is Cornerstone Esports that is progressively building an ecosystem to give platform to all stakeholders involved in the industry.