Diablo Immortal hits 30 million players, netted an estimated over $100 million

Diablo Immortal has sparked controversy among elements of Blizzard’s audience since it was first announced. The monetization model sparked a brutal backlash, it stopped being released in Belgium and the Netherlands, and Blizzard had to make a promise that Diablo 4 would not be monetized in the same way.

But the thing is, Diablo Immortal has certainly made some people happy. The last stats provided on the game by Blizzard was that it was downloaded (opens in new tab) by over 15 million players in two weeks, grossing nearly $24 million.

Two months after launch, the game now has over 30 million players.

The player numbers are coming from an official channel, but mobile market analyst SensorTower (opens in new tab) has also published a report about the game’s success, estimating that the title is now worth $100 globally. million has been exceeded. SensorTower’s data is generally accurate but such figures are extrapolating from public information and a sample set of users, so keep that in mind. These figures would also have received a huge boost from the game’s Chinese launch on July 25, where it quickly rose to the top of the download charts.

Whatever the exact stats, there is no doubt that Diablo Immortal has a lot of players, and it is making a lot of money. This game is a hit. Blizzard president Mike Ybarra recently went to bat for the game (opens in new tab), saying that the criticism did not reflect the widespread backlash: something that these figures would seem to support.

“When we think about monetization, at the highest level it was, ‘How do we give millions of people a free Diablo experience where they can literally do 99.5% of everything in the game? Yabara says.

“Monetization comes in the last game. The philosophy was always to lead with great gameplay and make sure that millions of people could go through the entire campaign at no cost. From that point of view, I was really a fan of it. I feel good as the introduction of Diablo.”

(Image credit: Activision-Blizzard/NetEase)

Blizzard says that the “vast majority” of players haven’t spent money on the game, and 50% of Immortal’s players are new to Blizzard’s game.

PCG’s Tyler Kolp spent some time with the game, and realized it was designed more to take advantage of your love of Diablo than to be a great Diablo. This, at least, is responsible for this title: Diablo Immortal player uses premium currency shenanigans to turn old WoW tokens into whale-killing necromancers.