There are so many great games out there from independent developers but we don’t often get to see these underdogs achieve widespread success.
Oftentimes, they just gain popularity in niche gaming circles without actually breaking the ceiling and entering mainstream gaming culture. This is what makes the story of Stardew Valley and its journey so far so much more impressive.
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Stardew Valley has gone from obscurity to being one of the most popular and fastest-growing games on the planet. But exactly how much has this indie farming simulator game achieved over the years?
What kind of following has it cultivated and how much revenue has it managed to generate?
This post is going to break down the successes of Stardew Valley with key statistics to give you a sense of how far the game has come and how it’s been performing since it was released.
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Stardew Valley History
Stardew Valley is an open-ended farming simulator game that allows you to grow crops, raise livestock, craft artisan goods, and build your skills in combat, mining, and ranching.
To understand and appreciate Stardew Valley’s appeal and achievements, you need to know where it’s coming from and how it all started.
Although it seems like an offering from a big-name game company, Stardew Valley is actually the brainchild of a lone creator Eric Barone, who goes by the name ConcernedApe.
Eric started building the game in 2011 after graduating with a computer science degree from the University of Washington Tacoma. The project initially began as a way for him to improve his computer skills and increase his chances of landing a job in the industry.
Taking inspiration from several games including Story of Seasons, Rune Factory, Animal Crossing, Terraria, and Minecraft, Eric started building the features for Stardew Valley.
The game’s premise was simple: you inherit a dilapidated farm from your grandfather and you’re tasked with tending to the ruins and helping the business and community thrive again.
Eric soon became so obsessed with the game that he abandoned his job quest and began working full-time to develop it. Not wanting to give up any aspect of his creativity and vision for Stardew Valley, Eric learned everything he needed to flesh out the game.
He created the game’s graphics, story, animations, dialogue, music, and sound effects by himself. In September 2012, Eric announced the game publicly and received a lot of interest and support from the gaming community.
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He leveraged this to build an engaged community around the game, creating subreddits and a website to gather feedback and share progress updates. Eric labored on the game for four years, rebuilding it multiple times and trying to perfect every detail before finally deciding to release it in February 2016.
Stardew Valley has continued to gain buzz since its official launch and Eric has remained the game’s only developer with ownership over all its publishing rights.
Today, more game content has been added to Stardew Valley. The game has also been made available on multiple platforms including Windows, Linux, macOS, Android, iOS, Steam, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and more.
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Stardew Valley Revenue Statistics
Let’s take a look at some Stardew Valley Statistics that shed a light on the number of sales and revenue the game has generated to date.
1. Stardew Valley made $24 million in revenue in its first year
Stardew Valley was released in February 2016 for $14.99 and its price has remained unchanged since. Within two weeks of its launch, the game had sold over 400,000 copies across GOG.com and Steam.
By the end of Stardew Valley’s second month of release, over 1 million copies of the game had been sold, making it a standout success in the saturated world of independent game creation.
When 2016 crawled to an end, Stardew Valley had earned over $24 million in sales revenue, surpassing many other games developed by big-name game studios. According to Valve, Stardew Valley was recognized among the top 24 best sellers on Steam in 2016.
What’s even more amazing is that Stardew Valley achieved these milestones in its first year while spending very little on marketing.
The secret to its impressive sales numbers was an enthusiastic community of gamers who not only bought the game for themselves but also helped purchase it for other players who couldn’t afford the game.
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2. In 2018, Stardew Valley iOS released earned over $1 million in sales
Two years after launching on PC, Stardew Valley’s creator Eric Barone decided to bring the beloved game to the mobile market. In collaboration with the British game development and publishing firm Chucklefish, he released the iOS version of Stardew Valley on Oct 24, 2018.
At the time of its release on iOS, Stardew Valley was priced at $7.99 per unit. The mobile version of the game enabled players to transfer their current progress from their Windows, Linux, and macOS devices to their mobile.
A feature that no doubt contributed to the mobile version’s appeal and spurred players to buy it. Within three weeks of debuting on iOS, the farming simulator game had grossed over $1 million in revenue, according to intelligence data from Sensor Tower.
The platform reported that players from the United States constituted the majority of the game’s first users on mobile, having bought about 41% of the units sold at the time. Following behind were Japanese users who accounted for 12% of Stardew Valley’s revenue in the first week of its release.
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3. Stardew Valley has made $130 million on Steam
Steam was one of the first platforms on which Stardew Valley was released and it has contributed a huge chunk to the game’s total sales and revenue.
Based on data sourced from VG Insights, the game has sold over 12.5 million units on Steam, amounting to over $134.4 million in gross revenue.
As astounding as this achievement is, it doesn’t come as much of a surprise when you consider that Stardew Valley has generated over 559,000 reviews on Steam and that 98% of those reviews are overwhelmingly positive.
With that much love and positive word of mouth driving it forward, the game’s outsized success on Steam and beyond makes a lot of sense and will most likely continue to grow.
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4. Stardew Valley has generated $300+ million in total revenue
Stardew Valley’s run is nothing short of impressive. The country life role-playing game has been a smash hit since the early days of its release.
After only two months of being on the market Stardew had sold over 1 million copies and it ended 2016 with more than $24 million in revenue.
Sure a lot of games manage to cross the 1 million sales mark in just a few days of release and many end up doing double, triple, and even quadruple more in sales revenue than Stardew Valley in their first year.
However, these games are usually part of an established games franchise or released by giant game companies with trailer loads of developers working to build them. They also tend to have the budget of a small nation powering their marketing efforts.
Viewed in this light, Stardew Valley is an outlier because it’s an independent game developed by one person. Its main promotional strategy is powered by its community of users who are constantly spreading the word about the game.
As 2017 concluded, Stardew Valley had sold over 3.5 million units, bringing in over $52.5 million in revenue. It also became the most downloaded game on Nintendo Switch in 2017 though it only launched on the platform in October of that year.
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According to Statista, the lifetime sales units for Stardew Valley hit the 10 million mark by January 2020, raising the game’s total revenue to $150 million.
In September 2021, the premium farming sim reached a new milestone with over 15 million copies sold and $225 million generated in revenue.
Within the next eight months, Stardew Valley sold another 5 million units, bringing its total sales numbers to 20 million units and amounting to over $300 million in lifetime revenue as of May 2022.
Unsurprisingly, PC accounted for the majority of those sales with over 13 million units shipped across Linux, Windows, and macOS platforms.
In just 7 years, Stardew Valley has accomplished feats that most indie games hardly dream of and many big-name studio-backed games struggle to reach. What’s more, its popularity shows no signs of slowing down any time soon.
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Stardew Valley User Statistics
User statistics can tell you a lot about how popular a game is and how much time people are actually spending playing or watching it. Here are some relevant data points about Stardew Valley’s users that are worth knowing.
1. Stardew Valley accumulated 17.2 million watched hours on Twitch in 2022
Although Stardew Valley doesn’t have replayability once you’ve completed the entire game, lots of people still get a kick out of watching it being played because of the relaxed and pleasurable feelings it evokes.
According to SullyGnome, Stardew Valley had over 17.2 million hours watched in 2022 on Twitch. Also, the total broadcasting hours for the game amounted to 1.4 million, with 163 channels streaming the game and 1971 viewers watching the game on average.
The total number of viewers who watched Stardew Valley on Twitch that year reached 79,852, which is no small feat for a game that doesn’t involve a lot of heavy action.
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Stardew Valley’s popularity continues to rise in 2023 as evidenced by the viewership numbers it pulled in the first quarter of the year.
So far, Twitch has recorded an average of over 1 million hours watched each month this year. Based on historical trends, the numbers are expected to rise or remain fairly constant for the duration of the year.
Currently, Stardew Valley is ranked the 129th most popular app globally based on the number of watched hours and viewers. This is outstanding considering that there are thousands of games being streamed on the platform.
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2. Stardew Valley records an average of 33,899 concurrent players on Steam
According to SteamCharts, a platform that provides round-the-clock analysis of Steam’s concurrent players at any given time, Stardew Valley had 33,889 average players in March 2023.
The peak number of concurrent players of Stardew Valley for that month was 52,043, while the all-time peak for number of users playing the game at the same time on Steam was 94,479.
These numbers are further proof that the peerless farming simulator game has an active community of players constantly exploring the excitement it has to offer.
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3. Stardew Valley has an average of over 700,000 monthly users
Based on ActivePlayer’s live player count and game statistics for Stardew Valley which it compiles from multiple reputable online sources, the game had 712,058 average monthly players in March 2023.
ActivePlayer’s data also revealed that an average of 272,956 users played Stardew Valley daily that month across all supported platforms.
According to Newzoo, Stardew Valley was ranked the #69 most popular PC game and #244 most popular console game based on the number of monthly active users the game has.
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4. Stardew Valley has been downloaded over a million times on Android
Mobile users constitute a sizable portion of Stardew Valley’s audience. The game has received over 1 million downloads from Google Play Store since the Android version was released in March 2019.
Although there is no published data measuring the number of downloads that Stardew Valley has earned via the Apple App Store, the figure is believed to be several hundred thousand worth.
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Conclusion
The game might be crowded but Stardew has proven that with the right mix of tenacity, creativity, community, and excellent features, you can rise above the noise.
Stardew Valley’s revenue and user statistics have unlocked and maintained an upward trajectory every year since its release.
The game is constantly reaching new audiences while being repeatedly enjoyed by existing users and there’s no doubt that it’s going to remain profitable for years to come.
