Call of Duty: Warzone 2.0, the latest iteration of the franchise’s hit Battle Royale, has reportedly seen a substantial decrease in players over the holiday period. Although no official statistics have been shared by Activision, the news does come from CharlieIntel, a reliable source when it comes to all things Call of Duty related.
“We’ve heard from multiple people that Warzone 2’s player count dropped over the break at a higher rate than expected”, CharlieIntel reported. It’s unclear exactly how many players have departed Warzone 2.0 since its launch in November of 2022, but that hasn’t stopped it from being one of the biggest free-to-play games around.
A new PlayStation blog post recently revealed that Warzone 2.0 was the most downloaded free-to-play game on both PlayStation 4 and 5 in the EU for the month of December 2022, and the second most downloaded in the US. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, which launched the month prior to Warzone 2.0, also continues to be one of the best-selling games on PlayStation.
YouTuber and all-around Call of Duty expert JGOD also chimed into the conversation, revealing a statistic chart of Modern Warfare II’s decrease in players on Steam. Although the figures are certainly alarming, it’s worth noting that this is only for users on Steam and also includes Multiplayer and DMZ, not just players for Warzone 2.0.
However, JGOD’s handy chart reveals that the peak number of players for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II has dropped from over 450,000 to just 121,000 between November 16th, 2022 and January 11th, 2023. In the span of two months, Infinity Ward’s latest Call of Duty title has dropped over 300,000 players on Steam alone.
There’s no exact way to determine what could be the cause of the rumored decrease in Warzone 2.0’s player count, but given the constant outcry from fans for the return of Verdansk, it’s likely related to the drastic changes seen between the original Warzone and its successor.