Twitch’s biggest streamer is not xQc or Ninja anymore

For roughly the past four years, it has been generally accepted that either xQc or Ninja were the ‘biggest’ or most popular streamers on Twitch. But, as of 2022, they’re no longer top dogs – instead, it’s a streamer many English-speaking viewers are not aware of: Auronplay.

His move to Mixer notwithstanding, Ninja is often held up as the biggest streamer on Twitch, simply because his follower number is the largest, at a whopping 17 million. Most of this, however, was accrued during his peak of popularity in 2018, and it doesn’t equate to the most viewers four years on.

If it’s not Ninja, then xQc is often dubbed the most popular streamer, because he’s consistently at the top of the ‘hours watched’ chart. However, while xQc is definitely number one for English-speaking streamers, this ‘hours watched’ figure is inflated because xQc simply streams more hours than almost any other broadcaster.

Instead, a much better metric of judging the most popular streamer on Twitch is two-fold: average viewers and followers gained. And in both of these categories, Spanish streamer Auronplay comes out way on top.

Auronplay is actually Twitch’s biggest streamer

Although Auronplay has always been huge on Twitch, 2022 has seen him boom like never before, as the Spanish-speaking community on Twitch grows too.

In the past 30 days, Auronplay has averaged 112,000 concurrent viewers – miles ahead of second-place Dream with 80,000 (who only streamed once for 3 hours). Averaging over 100,000 viewers on every stream is something no other streamer even comes close to.

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In followers, Auronplay has over 12 million, which is second behind Ninja’s 17 million. But, Auron has gained almost 400,000 new followers in the last 30 days, compared with Ninja’s 70,000.

What about hours watched, you may ask? xQc, king of the ‘hours watched’ stat, netted 21.5 million – almost double Auronplay’s 11.3 million. But, xQc streamed 280 hours – well more than double Auronplay’s 101 hours. If Auronplay had streamed the same amount as xQc, his hours watched would blow it out of the water.

The rise of Spanish-streams on Twitch

Auronplay’s success is part of a wider boom in the popularity of Spanish and Portuguese-speaking streamers. He is joined by the likes of Ibai, El Rubius, TheGrefg, Juansguarnizo (Colombian), and Alanzoka (Brazilian) in the top 20 of all streamers by following.

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Compare that to a few years ago, when only El Rubius featured in the top 20, and it’s clear to see that more and more English-speaking streamers are being moved down the rankings.

While the US & Canada is still Twitch’s biggest market, there is a very real potential that in the coming years, non-English channels and viewers will usurp the overall popularity of their NA counterparts, and Auronplay is leading the charge.