40 million players have played D&D

[ad_hoc]

Update:

WotC clarified that they told Bloomberg that 40 million people have played D&D in total (since 1974).

So not quite 40 million are playing 5e. I wonder what the actual number is. 30 million maybe?


According to Wizards, an estimated 40 million people play the game annually.


In 2017, 9 million people watched others play D&D on Twitch, immersing themselves in the world of the game without ever having to pick up a die or cast a spell.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-07-08/how-to-be-a-professional-dungeons-dragons-master-hosting-games

It's a little hard to fully comprehend just how massive the game is.

Our once small hobby is not small anymore.

[Willie the Duck]

Half a percent of the world population is a hard number to figure out the weight of, because I know there are huge areas where almost no one plays, and then other countries where it has a huge footprint. The 300k 2018 sales for North America (~580 million) is a lot easier to grasp, but it is starter set purchases, which doesn't tell me as much.

I wonder if it would be easy to figure out how many people worldwide 'participate in ______' so one could find a reasonable point of comparison. Such as 'now D&D as more popular than model train building, but behind karaoke.'

[Imbalance]

40 million is not quite half of the Wii's worldwide install base of more than 100 million, to wit. This is only a numbers comparison, but it's something.

[Waazraath]

Good. First because its a cool game. Second, because it makes it more worth it for the publisher to take good care of it.

[Talsin]

40 million people is about the entire population of California.

40 million people is nearly 10% MORE than the entire population of Canada.

40 million people is more than the population of 'Northern Europe' or what many people would call the Scandanavian countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, plus their dependents).

Stranger Things 3 has now been seen by about 40.7 million netflix accounts.

[NorthernPhoenix]

WOW! 5th Edition continuous to impress and amaze!

[Demonslayer666]

Interesting. I wonder how close that is to the actual number, or if the actual one is a lot higher.

[Imbalance]

A 1994 Rolling Stone cover story proclaimed that, "50,000,000 Beavis and Butt-Head Fans Can't Be Wrong." So, ten million to go?

[ad_hoc]

According to icv2 RPG sales in US & Canada rose another $10 million last year to $65 million/year.

Compare this to $15 million/year in 2013.

https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/43024/hobby-game-sales-total-1-5-billion-2018

[Yora]

Now that's an interesting number.

[ad_hoc]

Update:

WotC clarified that they told Bloomberg that 40 million people have played D&D in total (since 1974).

So not quite 40 million are playing 5e. I wonder what the actual number is. 30 million maybe?