Steam has broken its online record and is approaching the 42 million user mark

The Steam platform has set a new all-time high for concurrent users. Over the past 24 hours, approximately 41.8 million people were online, 200,000 more than the previous peak, set in October 2025, when 41.6 million were online.

The increase in activity appears to be natural. The figures were influenced by the ongoing New Year's holidays, when players have more free time, as well as the ending winter sale, which traditionally spurred interest in purchases and brings users back to their existing games.

Counter-Strike 2 remains the most popular game in the Steam ecosystem. During the reporting period, the shooter attracted a peak online player count of 1.6 million. Dota 2 held second place, with over 815,000 concurrent users. ARC Raiders rounded out the top three most popular games, attracting over 466,000 users.