'Counter-Strike' match breaks Twitch's streaming record
A Counter-Strike: Global Offensive match shattered a Twitch viewership record Sunday, reaching over 1 million concurrent viewers during the exciting finish of the ELeague Major.
ELeague's Twitch channel hit 1.026 million concurrent viewers while live broadcasting the grand finals of the 10th CS:GO Major -- put on by Turner and WME | IMG -- between Virtus.pro and Astralis, breaking Twitch's previous single-channel concurrent viewer record of 890,000.
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Twitch senior esports manager Christian Tamas tweeted the achievement during the event, with the highest number of viewers tuning in right after the match's conclusion when Astralis held up the ELeague Major trophy in victory. The previous record of 890,000 concurrent viewers was already broken earlier in the match during the second game of the best-of-three series.
On top of those Twitch numbers, the match was also broadcast on TBS, ELeague's website and YouTube, which is currently sitting at nearly 300,000 unique views. The match's television ratings will likely not be released until later this week.
The Major tournament playoffs ran from Friday to Sunday and regularly had over 300,000 concurrent viewers on Twitch during the quarterfinals and semifinals, with numbers sometimes reaching over 600,000.
The ELeague Major at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta was the first CS:GO Major since ESL One Cologne in July, featuring 16 of the best CS:GO teams in the world competing for glory and a $1 million prize pool. The Majors are the most important and prestigious tournaments in competitive Counter-Strike, and the grand finals match of the ELeague Major was one of the most exciting in history.
ELeague is owned by Turner Broadcasting, which also is an investor in Mashable.
