Apex Legends tops 50 million players

EA’s surprise battle royale release, Apex Legends, picked up over 10 million players in just 72 hours of its debut release, and 25 million players within a week. Now, it’s boasting 50 million players.

Apex Legends – a free-to-play battle royale game set within the Titanfall universe – released suddenly last month and made a huge impact, attracting one million unique players in the first eight hours. It’s now hit two million concurrent players and remains one of the most popular games on Twitch.

In a tweet on the official Apex Legends Twitter account, the team said: "Apex Legends hit 50 Million players worldwide! We are humbled by all your support and can’t wait to show you what’s next."

Apex Legends hit 50 Million players worldwide! We are humbled by all your support and can’t wait to show you what’s next. pic.twitter.com/QTDH57lfvB

— Apex Legends (@PlayApex) March 4, 2019

"Thank you to the 50 million players that have shown up in the first month since Apex Legends launched," Respawn CEO Vince Zampella added on Twitter. "You have all made this something special and there’s much more to come!"

Of course, there’s still some way to go before Apex Legends can be considered a real threat to Fortnite’s battle royale dominance, which has surpassed 200 million players. Fortnite reportedly earned $455 million on iOS in 2018, earning Epic roughly $1.6 million every day since it launched on the Apple store in March 2018. Epic Games’ earned $69 million through its fan-favourite battle royale game in just December last year, during which it was downloaded 5.2 million times – up 52 per cent from November 2018, and up 83 per cent on its previous strongest month – making it Fortnite’s biggest month to date.

In its third quarter briefing, Electronic Arts CEO Andrew House acknowledged Q3 was a "difficult quarter" for the company, admitting the publisher/developer "did not perform to [its] expectations" despite the launch of Battlefield V and Command & Conquer: Rivals during the reporting period.

"The video game industry continues to grow through a year of intense competition and transformational change," CEO Andrew Wilson said at the time. "Q3 was a difficult quarter for Electronic Arts and we did not perform to our expectations. We are now applying the strengths of our company to sharpen our execution and focus on delivering great new games and long-term live services for our players. We’re very excited about Apex Legends, the upcoming launch of Anthem, and a deep line-up of new experiences that we’ll bring to our global communities next fiscal year."