The mass Twitch exodus: Why streamers are leaving

A few years ago, if you were a streamer, you were on Twitch — simple as that. Outside of a few select content creators, everyone who wanted to be a streamer had to use Twitch’s platform. It was the only viable game in town. But over the last year, the streaming landscape has changed. Twitch still remains the largest streaming platform, but some of its biggest creators are signing exclusive contracts with platforms like Mixer, Caffeine, YouTube, and Facebook Gaming.

Which leaves fans with a question: Why? The answer is a lot more complicated than you might think.

The great migration

The first big streamer to leave Twitch was Tyler “Ninja” Blevins. Likely the most famous streamer ever, Blevins signed an exclusive contract with Mixer in August 2019. Blevins was one of Twitch’s biggest stars and one of the most recognizable streamers in the world. He had appeared on talk shows, partnered with the NFL for a Super Bowl commercial, played with celebrities like Drake, and hosted tournaments.

In the months since making the move, Blevins has spoken at length about his reasons for leaving Twitch. Chief among them were his ambitions outside of streaming. While he had made public appearances in the past, they were always a detriment to his streaming career.

“Wanna know the struggles of streaming over other jobs?” Blevins tweeted in 2018. “I left for less than 48 hours and lost 40,000 subscribers on twitch. I’ll be back today (Wednesday) grinding again.”

Photo: Ross Miller/Polygon

Looking back, it’s clear that Blevins’ move was a sea change for the streaming industry. If one of the largest streamers could leave Twitch, anyone could.

Brandon Freytag, the co-founder and SVP of Talent for Loaded — the management company that represents Blevins and several other well-known streamers — tells Polygon that Ninja’s team was well aware of this as they were making the deal with Mixer.

“We definitely knew Tyler going over to Mixer was the start of something. To what level, to what degree, we didn’t know,” Freytag says. “We definitely knew that with Tyler it would open the door. It certainly would change the industry.”

After just a few months, some of Twitch’s other high-profile streamers — namely Jack “Courage” Dunlop, Mike “Shroud” Grzesiek, Jeremy “Disguised Toast” Wang — started changing platforms as well. While many Twitch streamers have opted to leave, this new era has resulted in some streamers signing deals to stay with Twitch, such as Ben “DrLupo” Lupo, Saquib “Lirik” Zahid, and Timothy “TimTheTatman” Betar. Which means that the streaming industry isn’t moving away from Twitch; it’s just spreading out.

Why are streamers moving?

Whenever a streamer announces their move to a new platform, the questions that fans ask are almost always the same. They may suggest that the streamer will lose viewers, or question what amount of money would lock them to a certain platform.

Streamers like Blevins and Grzesiek have had significant decreases in average viewers since moving to Mixer, and with fewer viewers come fewer subscribers. To balance that out, it’s important to remember that these streamers are signing exclusive contracts, which usually come with financial compensation.

While the financial details of all of these contracts have remained private, most estimates have agreed that these are large multiyear deals. Some, like streamer Sebastian “Forsen” Fors, have estimated that top streamers like Blevins could be making $6 million to $8 million a year from these pacts. Even if those estimates are well above the real numbers, the income from the contracts would help offset some drop in viewers. But for the streamers themselves, these decisions often come down to more than just a dollar amount (though that’s definitely part of it).

While not every streaming service may have the same dedicated audience as Twitch, Freytag explains that they each offer their own benefits that can attract streamers. For Betar, Twitch’s broadcasting partnership with the NFL allows him to stream football games to his viewers while talking to the chat and commenting on the game. It’s a unique experience that no other streaming service can offer.

Meanwhile, Freytag mentions that Mixer opens up its own opportunities for streamers through its parent company, Microsoft.

“The vision, and what Mixer and Microsoft provided for [Ninja] specifically, was the right fit for him to continue to grow his brand and continue to push him forward,” Freytag said.

Since his recent move to Facebook Gaming in November of last year, Wang — who is represented by United Talent Agency — has already noticed a difference in the variety of his viewers.

“There’s a lot of people on Facebook, especially in Southeast Asia,” Wang says. “They just use it as their main form of social media. They’re not necessarily going to watch Twitch streams. I would say the majority of them aren’t watching streams right now, but the audience is already on the platform, and the potential to get some of them to migrate to being a stream viewer was very enticing to me.”

Image: Epic Games via DrLupo/Twitch

One of the factors that helped attract Lupo to signing a deal with Twitch is the audience he has built up there for his frequent charity streams for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

For some streamers, heading to a different platform also offers them a new challenge to help build something. While these streaming services aren’t exactly brand new, these partnerships give streamers the chance to have a voice in shaping the platform moving forward. For some, like Wang, that can even heighten the appeal of joining a newer service.

“I’m someone who kind of feels the need to grind when it comes to streaming,” Wang says. “So for example, when Teamfight Tactics was released, I think I was doing 12-hour streams every day for two weeks straight. And obviously, it’s hell on my body, but I was also enjoying it very much. But once that’s over, like, day to day, I feel a little purposeless — like, there’s no goal. It’s just, like, I’m going to stream today and I’m going to stream tomorrow. And I just saw no challenge there. [...] The reason I went to Facebook is, I feel like there’s an untapped market there.”

Regarding the recent moves away from Twitch of streamers like Grzesiek, Blevins, and Dunlop, Freytag says, “It excites them to start over and build up again and try new things. I think that’s part of the reason for Tyler and Mike and Jack moving to Mixer and YouTube, respectively. They get to — because the platform is earlier on, in the sense of comparative to Twitch — be a part of the process of that growth and provide feedback.”

It’s a process that Freytag thinks can benefit every service and streamer. With so many different competing platforms and so many streamers helping push those platforms in the right direction, everyone wins, according to Freytag. One example of this Freytag gives is that the cost of a subscription on Mixer used to be a dollar more than it was on Twitch; Mixer has since dropped the price to match Twitch.

“That, for me, was a big success [in] continuing to grow this industry,” Freytag says. “Competition is healthy. It moves everybody in a way that continues to push this industry forward for the better.”

Perhaps the largest benefit of spreading out for streamers is gaining leisure time. At the height of his streaming, Blevins talked about working 12-hour days just to maintain his following. When every streamer is on the same platform, everyone is constantly part of the scrum, shoving each other out of the way for a better spot and a few more subscribers and viewers. It’s exhausting.

Partnering with a specific site helps give streamers the ability to take a break now and then, according to Freytag.

“The word ‘vacation’ doesn’t exist in the streaming world very often, and it’s because, you know, naturally, everybody has to grind and put in a ton of hours,” Freytag explains. “In the past, the industry has been difficult for a lot of people. You’ve seen news articles before where people get burned out and have these long periods of streaming, and it’s not healthy to do too much of it. So it gives them certainly some more flexibility there.”

When the landscape spreads itself out, and streamers move to different platforms, the lanes suddenly open up. Being a top streamer that moves to a new platform may mean you sacrifice some of your views, but it also means keeping your loyal following — and more importantly, setting yourself up ahead of the constant grind. With fewer streamers on a platform, it’s easier to stand out, especially if you come with a built-in fan base. Even the streamers like DrLupo, TimtheTatman, and Lirik who have opted to stay with Twitch benefit from the change. With fewer high-viewer streamers to compete with, the need to be online as much as possible relaxes somewhat.

Wang describes his first few weeks streaming on Facebook as a big upgrade for his well-being.

“Oh, it’s great,” he says. “It’s way more relaxing. Part of my own discomfort on Twitch was just having to grind every single day to try to stay on top. Whereas on Facebook, it’s a little more relaxing.”

Wang goes on to say, “I think it shows in my behavior, because sometimes, when I’m on Twitch, I’m streaming something that I don’t want to stream — but half the stream, you can kind of tell, like, my mood; I’m a little more snappy.” He adds that since the move, he’s able to just play what he wants to play rather than trying to keep up with the trends, saying, “It’s definitely been more positive for my mental health.”

Image: Blizzard Entertainment via Disguised Toast/Facebook Gaming

What do the platforms get out of it?

Developing new talent is critical to new streaming services. While pulling in some of the biggest-name streamers is great for platforms like YouTube, Mixer, and Facebook at the moment, that isn’t the ultimate goal. Eventually, every platform wants to be known as a place where new stars like Ninja, DisguisedToast, and Shroud can start out.

And each platform’s process for building these stars is a little bit different. On YouTube, smaller creators can gain followings even when they aren’t streaming, through clips and stream highlights on their actual YouTube channel. Facebook has a partnership program called Level Up that offers new streamers various ways to help them progress and grow their channels.

“These are people from all around the world who are just taking the opportunity to just start their streaming careers,” says Leo Olebe, Facebook’s global director of games partnerships. “Maybe they’re dabbling, they’re not pros yet, but wow, do they really want to be. They’re going live, they’re able to find audiences, they’re able to grow those audiences, and unlock the ability to monetize their streams.”

Twitch and Mixer both offer partner programs that can help small streamers grow and gain access to more advanced features. But these partnerships with new and growing streamers do come with dangers for the sites themselves. Just recently, Mixer banned a streamer for a tweet saying, “Come watch a registered sex offender plays [sic] Fortnite with 10 year olds!” along with a link to his stream.

Each of these new streaming services is attempting to build itself up, not unlike the streaming talent they’re trying to cultivate. Each new partnership and popular streamer is a representative of the site’s identity, and gives fans a new way to think about that platform. This makes choosing high-profile streamers — especially those that are signing exclusive contracts — even more difficult.

“The only way you’re going to be able to build the world’s gaming community is by being really appreciative and thoughtful about what that community can be,” says Facebook’s Olebe. He adds that Facebook is prioritizing creators who will interact positively with the communities on the platform, which makes Wang — whom Olebe calls super positive and thoughtful — a perfect addition to Facebook Gaming.

What does this mean for viewers?

While these changes may be good for creators and new platforms, the effect on viewers still isn’t quite clear. A streamer’s most loyal fans may follow them to whichever service they move to, but what about everyone else?

It’s easy to see a world where game streaming turns into something like the current streaming wars between Netflix, Disney Plus, Peacock, and Amazon (and soon others). Viewers could tune in to their favorite streamer on one platform, then switch to another site to watch a different streamer. Maybe if you like football, you tune into TimTheTatman’s stream every week for Thursday Night Football.

In discussing the ways in which all this fragmentation between platforms affects the way people watch Twitch streams, Facebook’s Olebe says he believes that viewers will eventually find the site that they like best and stay there, forming small groups and communities on each platform.

With every platform competing to attract both the best existing talent and anyone who’s just starting out, the balance of power seems to have shifted to the streamers for the first time ever. When Twitch was the only real platform, streamers had no choice but to make things work there. Now, as the industry opens up, streamers have more options than ever to find the right fit for themselves and their community. It’s a small extra bit of control that can help make a streamer’s life easier and less stressful. And a happier streamer means better streams for the viewers — even though it means they may have to leave the comfort and familiarity of Twitch.