As the Chinese economy opens up after weeks of lockdown, the streaming service across the nation witnessed a surge as more than 560 million people, 62% of China’s 904 million internet users participated in live streaming videos, according to a government report released today.
According to the report, “Esports: Live Game” streaming led the chart with 260 million people watching their favorite streamers playing games such as League of Legends, DOTA 2, Call of Duty, and other games from publishers like Tencent, PUBG, Perfect World, Riot Games, and NetEase. This also accounted for a higher than the normal rise in the viewership of these games worldwide.
Whereas traditional sports aka live sports broadcasting holds the second position on the chart with 213 million people tuning in to watch livestreams of sports broadcasting. According to Xinhua, the state-run press agency, Live-host shows accounted for another 207 million, and live concerts of famous singers hit 150 million viewers.
An especially interesting part of the report was the use of the Live-streaming model by e-commerce companies. According to the report, Chinese e-commerce giants like Alibaba, as well as JD.com, hosted several product streams over their platform Taobao, where famous influencers were called upon to sell products. One such influencer, Li Jiaqi, was able to sell 15,000 tubes of lipstick in just five minutes.
With the population of China and an almost 64% internet penetration, these numbers are unexpectedly good and showcase a higher than normal growth. Given the circumstances of the spread of Coronavirus and the duration of various lockdowns, many people in China moved towards live streaming which also explains the sudden growth.
Going by data from China, a new trend of live streams is on the rise, and in the future, we may see more people and businesses move towards the live-streaming model as it becomes the new normal worldwide.
Author’s Note- The numbers don’t add up perfectly as the report didn’t factor the same user streaming two or more videos at a time. Although the 560 million users record only counts a user once.
