Streaming market analyst Stream Hatchet have released its Q2 2025 report, which includes several new insights into the world of streaming and esports. Amongst the data is the news that in Q1 of 2025, co-streaming surpassed the official broadcast for esports tournaments in terms of hours watched.
The news marks the turning point in what has been a long-running trend, with the two data points moving closer and closer over the last few years. The report revealed that co-streaming surpassed official broadcast, despite official broadcasts also growing 30% quarter-over-quarter, with overall esports viewership rising by 6% year-over-year.
OhnePixel’s IEM Dallas 2025 streams set the record as the most-watched co-stream in the Q2 period, with approximately 298,000 concurrent viewers.
Co-streaming is a sometimes controversial but symbiotic relationship
At times, the practice has caused controversy in the esports industry, as the success of co-streamers has been linked to the regression of official broadcast opportunities and quality. Instances include when LPL announced its co-streaming-only model, ending the use of official casters, and MSI having a smaller team for talent that is typical for the event.
The latter example brought about a reaction from Chris ‘PapaSmithy’ Smith, who stated, “The only independent variable of success is whether Caedrel turns on his costream or not.”
Yet the practice is still allowed, and often officially supported by tournament organisers, with Caedrel, OhnePixel, and Tarik all invited to co-stream from some of the most prestigious events in their favoured games despite their streams routinely outranking the official streams.
Caedrel recently attended MSI, Ohnepixel streamed live from the Spodek Arena at IEM Katowice 2025, and Tarik attends most Masters and Champions tournaments as a co-streamer. His latest in-person appearance, at VCT Master Toronto, even saw the Canadian playing the showmatch in front of his home crowd.
For tournament organisers, co-streaming seems to be beneficial for the metrics they are targeting, likely hours watched on the event as a whole, not simply on their official streams.
Esports streaming trends – League of Legends is the most-watched esports title
The report noted that overall esports viewership is up by 6% year-over-year, drawing 729 million hours watched in Q2 of 2025 despite the timeframe featuring 37% fewer esports tournaments in total.
The highest-ranked tournaments of Q2 were the BLAST.tv Austin Major, LCK rounds 1-2, and MPL Indonesia Season 15 – the Mobile Legends Bang Bang tournament. The tournaments drew 92m, 87m, and 75m hours watched, respectively.
MLBB’s high-viewership MSC at the Esports World Cup is currently being played with Selangor Red Giants OG amongst esports betting site favourites. LoL Worlds and TI are also upcoming so there may be more good news on the horizon for esports streaming data analysts.
Overall, League of Legends was the most-watched esports title on all platforms with 447m hours watched, but that was a decrease of 7% on quarter, with runner-up Counter-Strike 2 gaining 6% to 369m hours watched in Q2. Note, these figures include all streams of the games, not only esports broadcasts.
Darragh Harbinson is an esports writer specialising in Counter-Strike. He has written for Esports News UK, Esports Insider, UKCSGO, Dexerto, and Rush B Media.
