The Top 23 Gaming Trends of 2025

Cloud gaming rises with connectivity

While the global population is becoming increasingly internet connected – there are 5.56 billion internet users as of 2025 – many are still accessing the internet with just a phone, not a console or high-end desktop. That’s where cloud gaming steps in. It removes the need for expensive hardware, letting users stream graphically demanding games directly to their devices—unlocking access for players who previously couldn’t afford the gear.

Platforms like Moonlight PC and AirGPU are emerging as frontrunners. Moonlight lets users stream their own games from a gaming PC to virtually any device, while AirGPU offers remote rental access to high-performance gaming rigs by the hour—essentially giving players a cloud-based PC. These services ride the wave of broader technology trends in cloud computing, remote work, and digital accessibility.

As internet infrastructure improves and latency drops, cloud gaming could reshape how and where games are played—especially for mobile-first markets or casual players seeking flexibility without sacrificing performance. It’s one of the clearest signs of where video game trends are heading: more access, fewer hardware limitations.

Gamers shift toward DRM-free platforms

While Steam remains the dominant PC gaming platform, a growing number of gamers are exploring alternatives—often for better pricing, DRM-free downloads, or access to discontinued or indie titles. Platforms like GOG Games emphasize ownership, offering DRM-free versions of classic and new games.

This shift also reflects a broader desire among gamers for flexibility and transparency in how they access and manage their games. Some users seek out alternatives for ethical reasons—like avoiding intrusive anti-piracy software—while others are drawn by specialty libraries or specific platform perks. As players look beyond the mainstream, expect continued growth in this fragmented but increasingly relevant ecosystem of Steam alternatives.

Competitive gaming fuels training tech

The rise of competitive gaming is part of a larger wave in sports trends, creating two types of gaming culture. Some players just want to relax and have a good time, reflecting broader casual gaming trends, while others want to excel competitively. As games get more challenging, and players refine their techniques, it gets harder and harder to leave the first group and join the second.

Even for casual players, the required skill level is rising. Gen Y treats video games the way an older generation treated golf: as a way to socialize while also competing. This has led to a profusion of companies that offer training and analytics to help players build up their skills.

Refrag is popular in this space, focusing on improving players' skills in a specific version of Counterstrike. Counterstrike is one game of many, and far less popular than games like Fortnite, indicating that this is a large market with room for more participants.

eSports breaks into mainstream media

eSports has exploded into mainstream culture, with global audiences surpassing 300 million. This surge is driven by increased online streaming, easier access to gaming technology, and more tournaments, similar to current sports trends. Major media networks and sports brands are now investing in eSports, recognizing its potential to capture and engage younger demographics who prefer interactive and on-demand entertainment.

One of the top competitive titles is Counter-Strike 2 (CS2), with premier tournaments offering prize pools exceeding $1 million.

Gaming becomes lifestyle investment

As gaming cements itself as a core lifestyle activity, players are upgrading not just their gear—but their entire environment. From high-refresh-rate monitors to ergonomic chairs and LED keyboards, gamers are building fully customized setups to match both their performance needs and aesthetic tastes—part of a broader shift in video game trends toward gaming as lifestyle.

This surge in spending is partly fueled by shifts in furniture design. Just as home offices adapted to remote work, gaming spaces are being optimized for long sessions of play and streaming. Products like walking pads, a growing fitness trend, and adjustable gaming desks now cater to the crossover between health-conscious habits and immersive entertainment, while accessories like soundproof panels, ambient lighting, and even mini fridges have become staples in the modern gaming room.

Anonymity drives voice tech adoption

For years, video games have let players customize their character’s looks. But if they chat with other players during the game using services like Steam (over 100M monthly active users), they still have their real-world voice. For a number of reasons, gamers are increasingly using products like VoiceMod to customize their voice the same way for in-game chat, sparking one of the more unique video game trends.

Many freemium products get caught in a classic pricing paradox where total value is zero sum so the more value you give up front to free users, the less there is to give to paid users. But Voicemod creatively gets around this.

They offer a free version of the product, which includes a set of voice modifications—but they rotate which ones are available every week. It’s free to try out identities, but costs money to keep the one you like. It’s a form of price-discrimination; VoiceMod doesn’t bother selling to people who want to use a funny voice for a prank call, but does want subscription revenue from anyone who wants to choose their online identity.

This idea of renting an identity is similar to what’s seen in broader fashion & apparel trends, where maintaining style or appearance requires continuous spending. Cosmetics might be the most extreme example: you can use samples to look a certain way, but you have to make continuous purchases to keep your chosen appearance.

Streaming culture boosts earbud demand

Gaming earbuds represent the divergence of two separate trends: some people game to relax, and some people game to win.

Sites like Twitch have made it possible for gamers to earn a full-time living by playing video games and chatting with their audience. While some of these players are skilled, their role is not just to demonstrate elite gameplay; it's also to keep the audience engaged and entertained, whether or not the game itself is interesting. For these players, an important part of their work is their physical appearance, and they often opt for gaming earbuds, as opposed to more bulky over-ear headphones, as a way to look better while staying engaged with the game.

This also affects more than just professional streamers, as gaming is increasingly used as a way to socialize and how you look when you socialize—even when gaming—is sometimes important to gamers.

Earbuds are a category that has rapidly grown in popularity in the last few years, and as demand rises, there’s often pull from the market to offer niche-focused variants. In addition to gaming earbuds, there are earbuds designed for swimming, earbuds for sleep, even earbuds designed for pets. Since each of these products is optimized for one specific use case, it’s often suboptimal for others—a great set of noise-cancelling earbuds, for example, is dangerous while driving. Meanwhile, this same proliferation makes users more sensitive to price and features; no one wants to overpay for elements that don't benefit them, and gamers in particular are sensitive to the "gamer tax"—the fact that some high-performance products have a higher price point when targeting gamers.

Focus boosters target gamers

Fitness wasn’t always popular. The Olympics inspired a running surge in the 1970s. In the 1980s, stationary bikes first started making their way into gyms everywhere. And the release of Jane Fonda’s Workout exercise videos in 1982 is largely credited with kickstarting aerobics’ popularity and establishing one of the first modern fitness trends. In the grand scheme of things, the commercialization of fitness and its developments is a relatively recent phenomena.

As the fitness industry boomed, everything from supplements to courses took off and turned into a massive industry. The sports nutrition market alone clocked in at a whopping $16.5B in 2020.

Today, gaming is a massive and growing market - some estimates size the gaming market as even bigger than the movie business and North American sports put together. Another way to look at it: Top-grossing games earn $10B+ while top-grossing movies earn low billions. Many argue too that the gaming industry is still early in its days of commercialization, and that products like gaming-specific supplements represent the beginning of future gaming trends.

This has created a growing category of products and brands – everything from finger sleeves which are like sweatbands for gamers’ fingers to emerging brands like GamerSupps, Gamerbulk, and G Fuel which sell what is essentially caffeine for gamers. Sometimes the biggest categories start out as a new take on an old product.

And while the gaming market is bigger – financially speaking – than most people realize, it’s also broader demographically. Women make up 46% of U.S. gamers and almost 40% of gamers are older than 35.

Hardware aesthetics spark online sharing

By building computer parts that emphasize visual effects, companies are able to outsource much of their marketing efforts through the sheer number of consumers posting photos of their photogenic PC setup online, a common theme in TikTok gaming content.

This is the case with RGB fans. The gaming PC subculture prizes two things: computers that run incredibly fast and computers that look cool. RGB speakers and PCs have built in LED illumination, which light up the computer case with colorful patterns while the computer is running. These fans are no more effective, but are more expensive.

Similar products, but with an RGB take, are also growing: everything from keyboards to motherboards, cases, and even mousepads.

In what is more nuanced of strategy than it may initially seem, Corsair, a computer peripherals maker that pioneered RGB fans, has continuously launched more elaborate RGB fans. They've released new fans with more individual lights and lights on more parts of the fan, allowing users to display increasingly complicated patterns. As part of the strategy, they also offer a program for selecting and customizing light programs. By giving users software whose features can only be used with the latest hardware, Corsair is reusing some of the PC industry's playbook: faster computers led to more complicated software, and more complicated software made older computers obsolete.

Gaming becomes Gen Z’s hangout

Video gaming has become a top social activity for Gen Z and Gen Y, with nearly half of young adults reporting they made long-term friends while gaming. And 40% of Gen Z and Millennials reported socializing more in video games than in person. The rise of social platforms like Discord has taken things even further, making video gaming an even more social experience and confirming this shift as one of the key video gaming trends.