Apex Legends led all content on Twitch in terms of viewership in its debut month, breaking the 100M hours watched mark in the process.
The following titles are ranked according to the total number of hours watched on Twitch 
, from Feb. 1-28, with data compiled using TEO Analytics.
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Year-Over-Year
There is one glaring change from 2018 to this year in terms of content on Twitch, and that’s Apex Legends’ ridiculously fast sprint to the top of the chart for February in just its first month of being streamed on Twitch.
Numerous titles including Fortnite , League of Legends , Counter-Strike: Global Offensive , and Dota 2 all saw an increase in viewership from the same month last year, but none was able to match the 101.92M hours watched that Apex Legends produced in just its first month on Twitch after being released at the beginning of February.
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Meanwhile, the “Just Chatting” IRL subcategory drew 53.12M hours watched, up more than 20M from the 32.92M hours watched posted by IRL last year before Just Chatting existed.
Top Content: Reaching The Apex
EA’s Apex Legends came out at the beginning of the month and the response on Twitch was immediate and lasting. Not only did the game immediately shoot to the top of Twitch, but it stayed there all month reaching 30M hours watched for multiple weeks in a row.
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The game’s surge to prominence coincided with a significant decrease in viewership for Fortnite. While the game saw a year-over-year increase, Epic Games’ battle royale title saw a drop off from 94.12M hours watched in January to just 59.97M in February.
What’s Trending: Avoiding The Sophomore Slump
While Apex Legends got off to one of the strongest starts Twitch has ever seen for a video game on Twitch, the title’s numbers have slowly come back down to earth. This past week, the game led Twitch in terms of hours watched for a third straight week, but it’s viewership dropped significantly to 22.91M hours watched from the 30M figure it held the previous two weeks.
The title’s drop came as some streamers went back to playing Fortnite or a mix of both battle royale games. With Fortnite’s recently released package of in-game content, numerous gamers took at least some time to stream the freshened up game. From Feb. 25-28, the gap between Apex Legends and Fortnite became close with Apex Legends drawing 10.36M hours watched. Fortnite drew 9.07M for the four day period.
As the year rolls on, only time will tell if Apex Legends’ decline in viewership is just a market correction or if Fortnite will reclaim its spot as the most-watched game on Twitch, but regardless the gap is shrinking as people become more used to Apex Legends and Fortnite continues to produce new in-game content and cosmetics.
