After Vitality’s dominant victory over Spirit in the grand final, another electrifying edition of IEM Katowice came to a close. As one of the crown jewels of the competitive CS calendar, Katowice stands alongside legendary events like Cologne, Dallas, Rio, and top tournaments from the Perfect World and PGL circuits.
From its Half-Life roots through 1.6, Source, and GO, Counter-Strike remains one of the longest-standing esports titles, producing some of the most captivating matches in the world of esports which draws millions of views time and time again. CSt is showing no signs of slowing down despite its age.
If you tuned in, you witnessed a packed arena roaring with energy and Twitch chats buzzing worldwide. But just how big was this year’s Katowice? And how does it compare to other CS Majors?
Highest Katowice highest peak viewers ever
Peak viewership refers to the highest number of concurrent viewers at any given time, typically measured across platforms like Twitch and YouTube.
The 2025 edition of IEM Katowice set a new record for the Polish event, with nearly 1.3 million viewers tuning in for the grand final between Vitality and Spirit at the Spodek. This surpassed the previous peak of 1.2 million from the 2019 Major.
Given the caliber of the final, this level of interest was expected. Many considered Vitality and Spirit the two best teams of the tournament, though some argued that the true showdown had already taken place between NAVI and Spirit.
While the match wasn’t as close as some had anticipated, the demand for high-level Counter-Strike was undeniable.
| Katowice Edition | Peak Viewers |
| 2025 | 1,299,747 |
| 2024 | 972,312 |
| 2023 | 726,820 |
| 2022 | 1,122,015 |
| 2021 | 596,585 |
| 2020 | 1,002,132 |
| 2019 | 1,205,103 |
| 2018 | 519,727 |
| 2017 | 445,003 |
Over time, you can see that Katowice very quickly drew in large crowds online, with some wobbles in 2021 and 2023 but generally, it is becoming more and more popular every year and you’d fully expect 2026 to best 2025 at this rate (let’s hope so).
Second highest Katowice average viewers ever
Finals do tend to pull in the peak viewers for obvious reasons, but Katowice 2025 did a fine job of pulling in average viewers across the whole event. We calculated average viewers by the numbers of hours watched and airtime, courtesy of esports charts data for the event.
Only 2019 (400,147) had more average viewers per hour of airtime than 2025’s edition. Year on year there were 32% more people tuning in than 2024, which itself was up 21% from 2023. Not bad for a game as old as CS and proof that the transition from GO to 2 was a success for Valve.
| Katowice Edition | Hours Watched | Airtime (hours) |
Average Viewers
|
| 2025 | 30,661,137 | 80 | 383,264 |
| 2024 | 24,575,159 | 85 | 289,120 |
| 2023 | 23,502,236 | 99 | 237,396 |
| 2022 | 29,936,138 | 91 | 328,969 |
| 2021 | 19,773,767 | 88 | 224,702 |
| 2020 | 18,013,071 | 64 | 281,454 |
| 2019 (major) | 52,419,214 | 131 | 400,147 |
| 2018 | 9,398,897 | 58 | 162,050 |
| 2017 | 8,315,356 | 43 | 193,380 |
Over time, you can see that the average viewers trend for IEM Katowice follows the same pattern as the peak viewers, with YoY growth over the last 3 years.
Who pulled in the viewers at Katowice 2025?
Games involving Spirit held the highest peak viewers throughout, with NAVI second and Vitality third. Team Spirit matches were 3 of the 5 highest peak viewer matches, two of them involving NAVI. Crowd and Hotspawn favourites MongolZ vs Eternal Fire were 4th and FaZe vs EF were 5th. Interestingly, Vitality were not in the top 5 until their final.
| Team 1 | Team 2 | Round | Peak Viewers |
| Team Spirit | Vitality | Grand Final | 1,299,747 |
| Natus Vincere | Team Spirit | Semi Final | 1,036,326 |
| Natus Vincere | Team Spirit | Groups | 882,113 |
| The MongolZ | Eternal Fire | Quarter Finals | 672,423 |
| FaZe | Eternal Fire | Groups | 643,806 |
Most of the viewers across the tournament came from English speaking nations (573k peak) followed closely by Russia (386k peak). The majority of viewers watched it on Twitch (937k peak) with YouTube a distant second (381k peak).
Clearly, any tournament involving Spirit is going to draw big crowds.
How does IEM Katowice 2025 viewership compare with 2024 majors?
Katowice 2025’s numbers are very impressive and still impressive when compared to the 2024 calendar year. The only majors with higher peak viewers in 2024 were the PGL Major Copenhagen (1,853,954 peak viewers) and the Shanghai major (1,329,129 peak viewers) making Katowice 2025 third in that list. Katowice 2024 was 4th.
If I was a betting man, I’d wager that 2025 could be the year a CS LAN breaks the 2m concurrent viewer record.
How does IEM Katowice 2025 viewership compare with all time majors?
Katowice 2025 was a an impressive and respectable tournament but there have been some titans over the years. Katowice 2025 ranks 9th in terms of peak viewers and 10th in terms of average viewers. The Intel Extreme Masters are a big tournament but taking nothing away from the, simply put the PGL events dominate in terms of pulling in the big numbers time and time again.
| Rank | Name | Hours Watched | Peak Viewers | Airtime | Average Viewers |
| 1 | PGL Major Stockholm 2021 | 71,266,120 | 2,748,434 | 120 | 593,884 |
| 2 | PGL Major Antwerp 2022 | 68,098,937 | 2,113,610 | 116 | 587,060 |
| 3 | PGL Major Copenhagen 2024 | 58,268,918 | 1,853,954 | 105 | 554,942 |
| 4 | BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023 | 58,891,770 | 1,528,724 | 116 | 507,688 |
| 5 | IEM Rio Major 2022 | 69,517,244 | 1,428,993 | 126 | 551,724 |
| 6 | ELEAGUE Major 2017 | 42,822,355 | 1,331,781 | 72 | 594,755 |
| 7 | Perfect World Shanghai Major 2024 | 32,797,688 | 1,329,129 | 103 | 318,424 |
| 8 | ELEAGUE Major 2018 | 49,309,039 | 1,329,096 | 116 | 425,078 |
| 9 | IEM Katowice 2025 | 30,661,137 | 1,299,747 | 80 | 383,264 |
| 10 | IEM Cologne 2022 | 25,831,189 | 1,249,426 | 93 | 277,755 |
| 11 | IEM Katowice Major 2019 | 52,419,214 | 1,205,103 | 131 | 400,147 |
| 12 | IEM Katowice 2022 | 29,936,138 | 1,122,015 | 91 | 328,969 |
| 13 | FACEIT Major London 2018 | 61,030,688 | 1,084,946 | 150 | 406,871 |
What does this all mean?
Whether you’re a Counter-Strike fan or an esports enthusiast, record-breaking LAN events are a positive sign for both. Katowice isn’t the biggest event of the year, but its viewership surge suggests that more records could fall in 2025.
As CS continues to draw larger audiences, the competitive scene remains a strong platform for the next generation of stars—following in the footsteps of legends like GeT_RiGhT, s1mple, device, and ZywOo, alongside rising talents like donk and m0nesy.
These numbers are exactly what CS fans want to see as it means many more years of good CS on the horizon for fans and encouragement for aspiring players who are debating whether to specialise in CS or something else.
