Global Online Board Games - Market Share Analysis, Industry Trends & Statistics, Growth Forecasts (2025 - 2030)

The Global Online Board Games Market is expected to register a CAGR of 6.78% during the forecast period.

Global Online Board Games Market is expected to grow significantly due to increasing user penetration rates in developing countries. North America is one of the largest markets for international online board games. Several factors are now driving the online gaming market. Increasing penetration of the internet and smartphones are some of the key drivers that have driven the growth of online board games in the region.

Key Highlights

• Further, the global online board games market will grow at a CAGR of 6.78% during the forecast period. Despite intense competition from offline entertainment sources, the market has been experiencing popularity and acceptance among players.
• The eruption of the COVID-19 pandemic has expanded the market slightly. The imposition of lockdowns across the globe has positively affected online board games as an alternative for people for entertainment.
• Nowadays, Cafes are facilitating online board games events to curb the steep decline in footfall after easing lockdown restrictions worldwide. These cafes in the US region have witnessed a 35% decline in footfall. There are several reasons for the significant growth of the global online board games market, including the emergence of board game conventions, gaming cafes, and nerd culture.
• The increase in disposable incomes has been one of the major factors influencing the growth of online board games in the APAC region. Countries such as China, India, Japan, and South Korea, along with Malaysia and Indonesia, are expected to witness decent growth in demand due to the improvement in living standards coupled with growing internet penetration. Another major factor influencing the increase in the region is the presence of a large young smartphone-using population in China and India. The APAC online board games market is one of the fastest-growing segments.

Online Board Games Market Trends

Increasing Users of Smartphones

• From 2016 to 2022, the total number of global smartphone users grew at an average of 10.4% annually, with the biggest growth coming in 2017. That year, the number of smartphone users grew by 20.9%. Smartphones are also the most popular type of mobile handsets. The latest smartphone users statistics show that of all the mobile devices being used today, 76.9 percent are smartphones.
• The latest figures show an increasing number of smartphone users year after year. In 2022, the number of global smartphone users is estimated at 6.6 billion, marking a 4.9% annual increase. It is also 2.9 billion, or 79 percent, more than the number of smartphone users in 2016, just six years ago. Reports estimate that global smartphone users will continue to increase and hit 6.8 billion by 2023. With an expected global population of just over eight billion by then, the smartphone penetration rate in 2023 will be around 85 percent. In other words, more than eight in ten people worldwide will be equipped with a smartphone.
• The above factors triggered the download and use of online board games on smartphones for entertainment purposes. Games such as chess and monopoly are highly ended traditional board games. Such a trend of growing smartphone users is expected to bring further demand for online board games in the years to come.

In-App Purchases is expected to acquire higher revenue market share.

• Revenue from games on Google Play Store and Apple App Store in 2020 grew by 51.3% and 30.2%. Revenue generated through in-app purchases of fun on the Google Play Store and Apple App Store in 2020 increased by 51.3% and 30.2%, respectively, over 2019, according to Sensor Tower's app analytics firm's preliminary estimates.
• Throughout the pandemic, there has been a spike in online board gaming time, with more users moving from freemium to paid gaming apps. Six out of 10 serious gamers tend to purchase gaming apps, according to CMR's recent consumer research for 2020.
• Real money gaming apps, which allow players to compete for cash prizes, also reported similar trends. WinZO Games saw a 10x increase in paid players by the end of 2020 compared to the previous year. Newly released games such as WCC by NextWave and Chess by WinZO have seen massive transactions in the last couple of months.

Online Board Games Industry Overview

Global Online Board Games Market has many competitors, with multiple prominent players. Some major players, including Zynga Inc., GungHo Online Entertainment Inc., Nintendo Co. Ltd, Asmodee Digital, Tencent, and Chess.com, are adopting strategies for developing the online board games market like new product development, global expansion, acquisitions, and investments.

June 2022: Tabletop online board game publishing company, Asmodee, had officially announced that they would be producing Netflix board games. These board games would be based on several acclaimed series that have premiered on the popular streaming service, their install base spanning over 200 million users across 190 different countries.

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