Social gaming is transforming how we game.
In the past, it was all about single-player games and grinding your way through campaigns. The industry has changed, though, with today’s gaming world more focused on the multiplayer social side of things more than anything else. After all, it’s what most modern gamers want.
If you look at just some of the most popular titles from recent times — such as the newly released Counter-Strike 2 or a modern classic like League of Legends — the common thread is that they connect players together through team-based experiences. Sure, the gameplay is extremely fun, but what’s made these games so successful is that they encourage players to chat, interact, and work towards common goals.
The social gaming trend isn’t a new phenomenon, either. During the COVID-19 pandemic back in 2020, you’ll no doubt remember that almost the entire world was locked down. This led to millions of people hopping on their smartphones and gaming consoles to game with the outside world, with Among Us and Call of Duty: Warzone proving to be some of the crowd-favourites during that particular time period. It effectively kickstarted the social gaming era of today — and 2025 looks set to be one of the biggest years yet for the industry.
Social Gaming: What to Expect in 2025
- The global social gaming market is expected to reach a value of $39.44 billion by 2032, with a big surge of the growth taking place in 2025 (Business Research Insights)
- The social casino market will reach a value of $9.3 billion by the end of 2025 (The Business Research Company)
- Social gaming will make up 75% of the global video game and eSports markets by 2028 thanks to the growth of mobile games (PwC)
At the halfway point of the decade, social gaming is booming. And with 2025 now underway, the social gaming market is expected to continue its upward trajectory. All of this is being driven by a huge range of factors.
One of the biggest contributors to the growth of social gaming over recent years has been the social casino. According to industry expert site SweepsGods, social casinos like Stake.us, WOW Vegas, and McLuck have attracted millions of sign-ups since 2020, leading to what many are calling the social casino ‘explosion’. And the reason why they’ve become so popular is because they offer exactly what many today’s gamers are looking for, including multiplayer games, in-game chat, and the opportunity to win prizes. Because of this, the social casino market is projected to reach $9.3 billion (yep billion) by the end of 2025, making it one of the most important parts of the wider gaming industry. You can also expect plenty more social casinos to hit the internet over the coming year as their popularity continues to grow.
At the same time, mobile social games will keep dominating the charts this year. With mobile gaming in particular, a lot of the games that people download today are free-to-play and social. Think Clash Royale, PUBG Mobile, and countless others (most of which you see as soon as you open the app store). What’s great about most of these games is that they offer in-app messaging, social media sharing, and even leaderboards that players can climb, all of which are hallmark signs of classic social gaming. Gen Z and Millennials crave social gaming in the apps they download, so it shouldn’t come as too much of a shock how popular social gaming has become on mobile, especially amongst younger generations.
2025 will also see the continued rise in popularity of the metaverse, which is expected to be one of the main homes for social gaming over the coming decades. In the metaverse, we’ve already seen games like Somnium Space explode onto the scene and provide players with virtual worlds where they can socialize with each other, play mini games, and more. Many metaverse games also let players use VR headsets so that they can literally become immersed in these worlds, creating a real-life feel when you’re chatting and hanging out with other players. And even though the metaverse is still in its infancy and not yet fully ‘mainstream’, the emerging games from this sector — many of which have been trending on social media — are helping to put the metaverse on the map and attract thousands of new players. It’s also expected that VR headsets will become more affordable in the near future, so this will also give the social gaming industry another major boost.
Why the Social Gaming Trend Keeps Getting Bigger
It’s no secret that gaming trends have a reputation for quickly disappearing. Remember the Nintendo Wii and motion-controlled games era? Or when Google launched the Google Stadia only for it to crash and burn within a couple of years? The point is that it’s normal for trends to fade faster than they appeared when it comes to modern gaming, but this hasn’t been the case with social gaming at all. In fact, the exact opposite has happened: social gaming keeps getting bigger. Here’s why:
- Players get to connect with friends and strangers from all over the world
- There’s something for everyone, whether you prefer to interact via text chat or voice chat
- It’s a ‘shared’ gaming experience where people get to be part of the wider gaming community
Plus, there’s also the sheer fact that most social games tend to deliver when it comes to gameplay (it is gaming after all, so the gameplay is still just as important). For example, if you look at a game like Rocket League, it’s all about having fun in-game communication with friends, but the gameplay itself is extremely good, too, combining cartoonish car racing and soccer into a unique type of experience. That’s just one example from a huge list, as most other social games also offer excellent gameplay opportunities as well.
How to Get Started with Social Gaming
If you’ve eager to see what social gaming is about, it’s a very easy niche to get started with. The first step is to choose the right games: simple. As discussed a little earlier, there are tons of social games — quite literally hundreds of them — to pick from. This is true across console, mobile, and PC, so all you have to do is open the game store on your respective device and choose which ones you want to download (remember, a lot of today’s social games are free). And if you don’t want to download a traditional game, then the option is there to join a new type of social gaming platform altogether, such as a social casino site. It’s all down to your own personal preference, so we recommend trying lots of different options out before you settle on what you enjoy the most.
The Bottom Line
2025 is going to be a huge year for social gaming: that’s for sure. Social casinos will continue attracting millions of new players, the mobile gaming market will keep releasing smash-hit social games, and the metaverse will reach more users than it has in any other year. There’s a lot to look forward to, especially if you’re a gamer who wants to connect with a wider community of like-minded players.
