JDG vs BLG... a story told over and over
MSI 2023 Has Huge Viewership Drop In All-LPL Final
MSI 2023 has concluded with JDG beating BLG in an exciting 4-game series. This is the third time in a row that an LPL team has taken the crown at MSI and while it was one of the most hyped match ups going into the tournament, it seems that there were some teams that received more love from fans.
Esports charts tracks all viewership from various esports tournaments. Chinese viewership is not taken into account since those numbers are never made public, but the numbers still give great insight into the trends of viewers all over the rest of the world.
MSI 2023: LCK vs LPL Matches Were The Most Popular
This year, two LPL and two LCK teams were able to participate at the Mid-Season Invitational, which meant that we could have even more regional rivalries. For the last few years both LPL and LCK teams have been dominating the esports scene, since the LEC seems to have lost some of its competitive edge since the 2019 and 2018 season.
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The most viewed game at MSI 2023 was the upper bracket final between T1 and JDG, which went on to five games. The match raked in a total of 2.29 million viewers, a new record for the tournament as a whole. In 2022 the grand finals between RNG and T1 only managed 2.19 million viewers.
In 2023 the second most viewed match was the lower bracket finals between T1 and BiliBili Gaming with 2.18 million peak viewers.
Where did the grand finals of the 2023 Mid-Season Invitational rank though? It seems that fans have had enough of BLG vs JDG, a match up we've seen our fair share of in 2023 already. Not only have the two teams faced off against one another in the second round of the bracket stage, but also the fourth round of the LPL playoffs, as well as grand-finals.
The MSI final was the fourth time the teams met in a best of five scenario. In the previous 3-instances the results were overwhelmingly in the favour of JDG and with BLG having taken on the underdog role throughout the LPL playoffs and MSI bracket stage, many believed that this was a shoo-in win for JDG.
The MSI finals peaked at 1.1 million in viewership. According to one Twitter user, even Chinese viewers were not as excited for this final, with LPL vs LCK match ups gaining much more attention on message boards, and even adding a screenshot of viewership on BiliBili streaming, in which BiliBili Gaming vs T1 had over double the viewers of BLG vs JDG.
Overall, MSI 2023 was a huge success in terms of viewership, especially with the new format which allowed for many best of five and best of three series, something fans have been asking for. Average viewership and hours watched have increased significantly according to esports charts, so let's see how Worlds 2023 and the new format will fare.