Niko Partners: MENA-3 games market to grow 56% by 2026

Niko Partners predicts that games income in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt (MENA-3) will grow 56% from $1.8 billion in 2022 to $2.8 billion in 2026. This represents a CAGR of almost 10% — indicating a serious progress alternative for the area. This forecast is a part of the games market analysis agency’s second annual MENA-3 Games Market Report & Five-Year Forecast.

MENA-3 progress

In addition to this income progress, the agency estimates the variety of avid gamers will even grow almost 30%, from 67.4 million final yr to 87.3 million by 2026. This interprets to a CAGR of about 6%, which implies that customers are usually not rising almost as quick as spending. As a end result, the agency predicts that common consumer spending will improve over the subsequent 5 years.

Niko Partners factors to three drivers of this income progress: cellular gaming, private and non-private sector investments and esports.

Mobile is the biggest platform by income and gamers in MENA-3. Accessibility is a key issue — there’s a wholesome market for consoles and PCs, however cellular is projected to grow by double digit CAGR over the subsequent 5 years.

Investments in gaming and esports have made headlines not too long ago. In specific, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) and its subsidiary Savvy Games Group made a number of excessive profile investments. This features a $38 billion plan to make Saudi Arabia a world hub for gaming.

Esports in MENA-3

Esports serve to drive journey and tourism to the nation and strengthen the nation’s place within the games market. Savvy acquired prime occasion organizers ESL Gaming and FACEIT for a complete of $1.5 billion final yr and the flagship Gamers8 competition will return in July 2023. Additionally, rival organizer BLAST has partnered with Abu Dhabi Gaming to host occasions within the UAE.

Niko Partners expects that by 2026, MENA-3 might be competing with hubs like Singapore and China.

The agency’s information additionally helps this funding technique into esports. 73% of avid gamers in MENA-3 have interaction with esports in some capability. This contains corresponding to watching esports content material, taking part in esports-focused titles or competing in beginner or skilled tournaments. This reveals broad attraction for aggressive gaming within the area.

More particularly, about two in 5 avid gamers throughout the MENA-3 area watch esports content material (41.7%) or play esports titles (40.7%). An additional 12.4% have competed in beginner or professional esports tournaments themselves. Further funding and high-profile occasions might incentivize extra engagement with esports — a wanted progress phase for the business.

Regional Differences and Demographics

MENA-3’s viewers can also be driving its progress potential. While gaming continues to skew closely male within the MENA-3 area — 67.4% of avid gamers in MENA-3 are male vs. 53.7% of the inhabitants — the viewers is younger on common.

76% of avid gamers within the MENA-3 area are beneath the age of 35. Egypt specifically stands out, having a considerably greater share of avid gamers beneath 25 years previous in contrast to Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Additionally, Egypt has the biggest inhabitants of avid gamers and is the quickest rising market within the MENA-3
area.

In comparability, Saudi Arabia is the biggest market by games income and is taken into account the gaming powerhouse of the area in accordance to Niko Partners. Of course, that is partially fueled by the PIF’s investments. Meanwhile the UAE has the best ARPU of the three markets.

These outcomes are primarily based on Niko’s ongoing insights and evaluation from regionally-based analysts, proprietary market mannequin and 5-year forecast, a survey of 1,126 native avid gamers and interviews of business professionals from the area. Niko Partners full 100-plus web page report on the MENA-3 area is accessible now.

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