Epic says its PC game store, which serves as Fortnite's launcher, has 108M users and generated $251M in 3rd-party game sales since its debut in December 2018
The company is also extending its free games program through 2020 — Epic has some new metrics for the Epic Game Store a little over a year after its launch.
Context & Ripple Effects
A year into its existence, Epic is putting hard numbers on a bet it made when it launched the PC store as an offshoot of Fortnite's launcher in December 2018: 108M users and $251M in third-party game sales so far. The audience was seeded by Fortnite itself, which had already scaled from 125M registered players under a year after launch to 350M by mid-2020.
The metrics drop lands alongside an extension of the free-games program through 2020 — the acquisition engine that converts Fortnite's player base into store accounts. The follow-on coverage validates the trajectory: by early 2021 Epic reported 160M+ PC users and $700M+ spent in 2020, though its 58M monthly actives still trailed Valve's 120M.
First-order effects
- Third-party developers on the store now have a verified revenue figure — $251M across roughly 13 months — against which to judge whether Epic's exclusive deals and revenue split are paying off relative to larger storefronts.
- Extending free games through 2020 keeps Epic subsidizing user acquisition directly, converting Fortnite's install base into store accounts at no cost to the player.
Second-order effects
- Valve faces a rival whose storefront costs are effectively bankrolled by Fortnite rather than by store margins, pressuring Steam on revenue splits and exclusive content without Epic needing the store itself to be profitable.
- Publishers weighing PC exclusivity offers gain a benchmark: Epic can now point to disclosed user counts and third-party sales when negotiating, shifting leverage in storefront deal-making.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds — user counts growing faster than monthly-active engagement relative to Steam — PC distribution consolidates around two subsidized challengers versus one incumbent, making storefront terms a standing cost of doing business for PC publishers.
- The disclosure cadence itself becomes structural: Epic publishing annual metrics turns store share into a public contest, inviting scrutiny of take rates across PC and mobile platforms alike.
The trend: PC game distribution is becoming a two-front war where Fortnite's profits fund a long-term challenge to Steam's storefront dominance, measured through annual metric disclosures.