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
they work Jacob Siegal / BGR : Epic Games Store giving away free games every week through 2020 Tweets: @polygon : Epic Games Store to continue giving away games weekly in 2020 https://www.polygon.com/... https://twitter.com/... SamuraixETHOS / @gamingethos : Regardless of scare tactics and yt conspiracy narratives, EGS starts off strong. While they still have room for improvement this is more evidence that once again a vocal minority do not represent the greater amount of PC gamers https://twitter.com/... @besubaru : Let's be real. A majority of those 108 PC customers were in it for the free games, or the fact that there's no sales tax on EGS. I bought my copy of RDR2 on EGS instead of RGSC or Steam, because I would have saved six bucks. https://twitter.com/... Daniel Ahmad / @zhugeex : - Epic Game Store has grossed $680m - 108m accounts have downloaded at least one game from the store. - 300m Epic accounts registered across all platforms. - Third party game revenue is $251m and 60% higher than forecast. Worth a read for the full breakdown. https://twitter.com/... @larsiusprime : Are these the first specific numbers we've had released on the EGS? https://twitter.com/... Paul Tassi / @paultassi : Hmm turns out downloading two launchers is not that hard https://twitter.com/... @dxfromyt : Another successful boycott from gamers. https://twitter.com/... Dom / @domsplaying : One clarification: The 108 million customer figure is for those accounts that have downloaded at least one PC game, whether paid or free. Epic Games overall has 300 million registered user accounts across mobile, console and PC platforms. https://gamedaily.biz/...
Context & Ripple Effects
The Epic Games Store launched in December 2018 as an add-on to Fortnite's client, and this disclosure shows how deliberately Epic converted its battle-royale funnel into a storefront: Fortnite had already hit 125M registered players under a year after launch and would climb to 350M registered players by April 2020, giving every one of those accounts a pre-installed store. The 108M-user figure and $251M in third-party sales are Epic's first hard numbers on whether that funnel converts.
The caveat embedded in the coverage is conversion quality: Epic committed to giving away free games weekly through 2020, and observers like Daniel Ahmad noted most of those 108M accounts likely arrived for the freebies rather than purchases. A year later Epic reported the store had grown to 160M+ users with $700M+ spent in 2020 — but only $265M of that on third-party games, keeping the same ratio problem in view.
First-order effects
- Third-party developers selling on the store gain access to a 108M-account base attached to Fortnite's launcher, though $251M spread across roughly thirteen months suggests most of those accounts have yet to buy anything.
- Epic now has baseline metrics it can publish annually, turning store performance into a recurring public benchmark rather than private speculation.
Second-order effects
- Valve faces a subsidized challenger whose user acquisition costs are effectively zero because Fortnite ships the store to every player — and the later MAU comparison (58M for Epic's store versus Valve's 120M in 2020) shows Steam still holds the engagement lead Epic must close.
- Weekly free-game giveaways become a standing cost line Epic must sustain to keep inflating the account base, pressuring rivals to match giveaway-style promotions or lean on their own exclusives.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, PC storefront competition becomes a war of launcher-attached ecosystems where hit games fund customer acquisition — shifting the moat from catalog size to which publisher can cross-subsidize a store indefinitely.
- The gap between registered users (108M) and third-party spend ($251M) frames the industry's open question: whether free-game-driven account growth ever converts into durable purchasing behavior, or whether storefront value stays concentrated in first-party titles.
The trend: PC game distribution is consolidating around launcher ecosystems where blockbuster first-party titles subsidize storefront land-grabs, with annual user disclosures becoming the scoreboard.