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World Of Warcraft Subscriptions Shoot Back Up Above 10 Million Thanks To Latest Expansion
World of Warcraft subscriptions are higher than they’ve been since the beginning of 2012. Blizzard reports that the release of Warlords of Draenor has lifted the numbers by over 2.6 million, up from 7.4 million the end of the third quarter.
Additionally, 3.3 million copies of the expansion have sold through to customers. This follows a trend upward as Warlords of Draenor’s release approached, as 600,000 players returned to Azeroth last quarter.
This could explain why Blizzard had some server problems around the game's launch last Friday. This is also good news for Activision Blizzard, which just settled a lawsuit for $275 million. For more on World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor, check out our coverage from earlier today.
Our Take
World of Warcraft subscriptions have been on the decline since 2012, dipping as low as 6.8 million at the midway point of 2014. This is down from a high of 12 million in mid-2010.
I strongly suspected WoW would rebound, but not by this much. Whether Blizzard can hold onto these returned players in the long-term remains to be seen. Even if numbers start to trail off once more, it shows that there is still great interest in new content for the decade-old MMO.
As for the timing of this announcement, I suspect it was designed to mitigate the impact of the lawsuit settlement we reported on just a little while ago.
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