The 2024 Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) Katowice delivered a viewership knockout, smashing records across multiple metrics.
Peak audience swelled to around 972,000, a mammoth increase of approximately 33% year-over-year. This emphatic result throws down the viewership gauntlet for other major 2024 Counter-Strike tournaments to try and match.
TLDR
- Peak viewership for IEM Katowice 2024 reached approximately 972,000, an increase of about 25% over 2023
- Average viewership also grew from 235,000 in 2023 to 287,000 in 2024
- Viewers watched over 1 million more hours of programming in 2024 compared to 2023
- The grand finals between FaZe Clan and Team Spirit drew the highest viewership of the event
- Despite being eliminated in quarterfinals, ENCE had more total hours watched than semifinalists MOUZ and Falcons
Diving deeper into the viewership explosion reveals even more staggering statistics. Average viewership leapt to 287,000, up 22% compared to 2023, despite 15 fewer hours of airtime. Astoundingly, fans consumed an extra 1 million-plus hours of thrilling IEM Katowice 2024 content.
These remarkable figures were fueled by a gripping finale that saw Russian expatriates Team Spirit defeat international favorites FaZe Clan. Their clash sparked the highest viewership of the entire event, underlining Team Spirit’s captivating underdog narrative as they emerged from the play-in stage to spectacularly grab the trophy.
Yet viewers remained glued to their screens even when the tournament’s biggest names failed to advance. A prime example was ENCE, ousted in the quarterfinals, who racked up more total hours watched than both MOUZ and Team Falcons who progressed further. This demonstrates that nail-biting matchup uncertainty trumped individual team star power in driving 2024 viewership gains.
It wasn’t only English broadcasts feeling the love either. Multiple languages posted huge viewership leaps, topped by a 45% spike for Polish streams which established fresh all-time Esports records. Russian, Portuguese, Turkish and Ukrainian feeds witnessed similarly dramatic upshifts.
