Battlefield 6’s High Player Count Has Fans Thinking They Might Actually Beat Call of Duty This Year

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Battlefield 6 started showing a lot of promise with early previews, and the game hasn’t really slowed down since. The latest Battlefield installment didn’t even come out until 10 AM EDT, but it is already surging up the Steam concurrent player charts. As of this writing, the game sits solidly at the 2nd highest player peak on the platform, with a 24-hour peak of over 747,440… and many people here in the U.S. aren’t even off work for the weekend yet. The launch hasn’t been without issue, and even so, Battlefield 6 has players think it might actually outsell the new Call of Duty.

Players Flock to Battlefield 6 Despite Server Struggles, Showing Impressive Day 1 Numbers

Image courtesy of Activision and Electronic Arts

As is typical for the launch of a new online game, Battlefield 6 is having a bit of a server struggle with the influx of new players. There’s been a pretty massive queue for matchmaking since the game’s release, leading to wait times before gamers can truly get in on the action. On top of that, some players are running into a “content not installed” message that stops them from being able to actually access the game. But minor snags aside, Battlefield 6 is attracting the attention of hundreds of thousands of players already.

Right at launch, the game had over 700,000 players ready to try and load in on Steam alone. And the FPS is a multplatform launch, meaning the true player numbers across Steam, Xbox Series X|S, and PS5 are likely much higher. And that has some longtime Battlefield fans revisiting a long-held dream, outselling the other major genre juggernaut, Call of Duty.

Fans started speculating about the potential for this next Battlefield game to outsell CoD early, and for good reason. Call of Duty has historically outsold Battlefield, with many players defaulting to CoD as their go-to FPS. But whether or not this game will be the one that finally does it, early indicators show that Battlefield 6 is well on its way to commercial success. Along with those high concurrent player numbers on Steam, the game is also listed as the platform’s best seller. And that’s before figuring in all the console players, who are no doubt contributing to the struggles the servers are encountering on day one.

Do y’all honestly see Battlefield 6 outselling Black Ops 7?
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We won’t have firm numbers for actual Battlefield 6 sales for a few days to weeks, depending on whether EA has big milestones to share. But given that the game’s Battle Royale mode, which is rumored to be free-to-play like Call of Duty: Warzone, isn’t out yet, these player numbers are a good indication that sales are pretty high. And for those hoping to finally see Battlefield prove itself against a Call of Duty game, that’s a good sign.

The newest CoD installment, Black Ops 7, won’t be out for another month. It arrives on November 14th, with a multiplatform release on Xbox One, Xbox Series X}S, PS4, PS5, and PC. This does give the game a leg up on Battlefield, which left prior-gen consoles out of the equation. But early previews haven’t been as impressed with Black Ops 7, so it’s possible that Battlefield will indeed claim some former Call of Duty fans this time around. Of course, there’s no rule that FPS fans can’t play both games. But it will be interesting to see how sales shake out for these two competitors once they are both out in the wild.

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