Mobile Legends: Bang Bang (MLBB) regional esports league MPL Indonesia Season 14 has recorded a peak viewership of 3.9m, becoming the third most-watched tournament in the title’s history.
According to esports data platform Esports Charts, the event garnered 511,551 average viewers and over 117m watch hours across its 229h run time.
The 14th season of the franchised league ran from August 9th until October 27th, featuring nine teams and a total prize pool of Rp4.86bn (~£238,000). The Grand Final between RRQ Hoshi and Team Liquid ID garnered the highest viewership during the event.
Although Team Liquid ID walked out victorious, RRQ Hoshi dominated in terms of audience popularity. The organisation accumulated 55m hours watched compared to Team Liquid’s 38.4m. Team Liquid only recently expanded into MLBB by acquiring esports properties AURA Esports and ECHO Esports this year.
Similarly, Fnatic’s new MLBB roster, Fnatic ONIC, was the fifth most popular team (23.4m watch hours), surpassed by Bigetron Alpha (23.8m) and Geek Fam ID (23.9m).
MPL Indonesia Season 14 has exceeded all other iterations of the MPL in terms of viewership. Only the MLBB Championships of 2023 and 2022 were more popular among the game’s fans, with 5.1m and 4.3m peak viewers, respectively.
Notably, the circuit has also become the eighth most-watched esports tournament of all time. This achievement highlights the relevancy of the local Indonesian MLBB audience as such viewership numbers are predominantly reached by major international tournaments. For instance, last year’s edition of the League of Legends World Championship sits at the top with 6.4m peak viewers. It is important to note, however, that Esports Charts does not include Chinese viewership data due to how difficult exact data is to obtain in the country.
Unsurprisingly, the overwhelming majority of viewers (3.7m peak viewers) tuned into the Indonesian broadcast of the latest MPL Indonesia edition. A similar dominance can be observed regarding the streaming platforms, where YouTube (2.6m peak viewers) and TikTok Live (1.3m) had the largest audience slice, compared to merely 386 peak viewers on Twitch.
As the regional leagues conclude, the MLBB esports scene is moving closer towards the global, season-ending event of the year. The M6 World Championship will kick off on November 21st in Malaysia’s capital, Kuala Lumpur, with a prize pool of $1m (~£771,000).