Steam Breaks Record For Most Concurrent Users With Nearly 28 Million Players Online

While we might only be mere days into 2022, it looks like Steam is already crushing its New Year's resolutions. Less than two months after the platform shattered its previous record of concurrent users back in November, Steam has once again achieved an all-time high number of active users, coming in just short of 28 million people logged on to the service as of 10 AM ET on January 2. Of these 27.9 million users, just over 8.2 million were actively playing a game via the PC gaming client, according to SteamDB.

As for which games were the among the most played when the new record was set, Valve's own free-to-play shooter, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, unsurprisingly topped the list, maxing out with a whopping 867,000 players online. Another Valve original, Dota 2, trailed just behind at 761,000 players. In addition, PUBG, Apex Legends, and Grand Theft Auto V also all made their way into the service's most-played games list, making the day's top games list a nearly perfect replica of Steam's most played games of 2021.

The news comes in the midst of Steam's annual winter sale, which began on December 22 and runs until January 5. This might explain why games such as Yakuza: Like a Dragon, It Takes Two, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, and several other games currently on sale have seen an influx in players, likely contributing to Steam's new record.

Of course it's also worth mentioning Final Fantasy XIV also ranked quite high on the service's most played game list, even with Square Enix trying its hardest to keep folks away from the servers due to some pretty intense congestion by suspending sales. However, if you're looking to pick up some games that aren't Final Fantasy XIV, several other fantastic Steam games are still heavily discounted over on the client until January 5, and naturally we have plenty of recommendations for you.