Free Fire recently hit a new peak of 60 million daily active users, according to Sea Limited’s fourth quarter and 2019 full results, which were released earlier today. The company that owns Garena also revealed that the battle royale was the most downloaded and the highest-grossing mobile game in Latin America and Southeast Asia in 2019, according to App Annie.
The tech company based in Singapore also mentioned Free Fire’s success on YouTube, reaching 30 billion views globally in 2019. This makes the battle royale the fourth most-watched video game and first most-watched mobile-only game on the platform. With the game’s enormous success, Sea Limited attributes its 208-percent revenue increase in digital entertainment to the rise of Free Fire as the most important mobile game of the year.
Free Fire’s success in Latin America and Southeast Asia is due to Garena’s efforts to engage with players at esports events. The Free Fire World Cup, which happened in Bangkok, Thailand, already showed the game’s success in early April 2019, peaking at one million viewers. EVOS Capital, a squad from Indonesia, won the tournament, but the presence of two Brazilian squads caught Garena’s attention in terms of Free Fire‘s growth in South America.
Related: Garena reveals esports plans for Brazilian Free Fire scene in 2020
In Brazil, the Free Fire Pro League experienced a surprising leap in viewership during 2019. In February, the first season of the Pro League had a peak of 19,000 viewers while only being broadcast on YouTube. The third season, which happened in November and sent two teams to the Free Fire World Series in Rio de Janeiro, registered one million peak viewers and was live on Facebook, YouTube and Twitch. That’s more than a 500-percent increase in less than a year.
The Free Fire World Series was also a big surprise for esports fans. The tournament that featured a $400,000 prize pool happened in Rio de Janeiro in November 2019. The winning team was the Brazilians of the Corinthians squad and the competition peaked at two million viewers.
Even though Garena’s efforts paid off last year, the company hasn’t stopped trying to make Free Fire as global as it can be. Last month, the company launched the BOOYAH! streaming platform, which is completely focused on Free Fire related content.
