The Blast Premier 2020 Fall Series groups had the second-most peak viewers of any CS:GO event thanks to a high proportion of Portuguese viewers tuning in.
The most-watched series was the debut of MIBR’s new roster against the kings of CS:GO Astralis, which reached 512,971 viewers via Esports Charts. The close series saw MIBR pushing the first Vertigo map to 33 rounds, winning on Nuke, before being dismantled handily on Inferno.
Related: MIBR LUCAS1: “I’m always confident, so I do believe in our chances at BLAST”
Besides the matchup between G2 and Astralis, which drew 423,823 viewers, all of the top five highest viewership series saw MIBR or FURIA involved.
The record for fully online tournaments stayed with the ESL Pro League Season 12 Europe, where the grand finals between Astralis and Natus Vincere drew 568,406 viewers.
In terms of demographics, there were 312,872 peak Portuguese viewers vs. 193,744 English viewers. The overwhelming Brazillian support aside, the tournament averaged 190,662 viewers
While these are respectable numbers, it’s always hard for online tournaments to compete with the allure of LANs. Before the COVID-19 pandemic forced tournament organizers to move their competitions online, IEM Katowice 2020 held in February saw a peak of just over 1 million watchers, along with an average of 279,453 viewers.
Fortunately, the Counter-Strike Professional Players’ Association is in talks with tournament organizers about a return to LAN competition. There’s no definite date in mind yet, but higher stakes should see viewers returning in droves.
