Olivia R. May 18, 2019
After Valve decided to rework Dota 2's professional circuit schedule for the 2018-2019 season, there's been a major jump in viewership.
The Mar's Dota 2 League Disneyland Paris Major played host to the two most-watched Twitch channels that week, on a weekend that resulted in Dota 2's most-watched day of the entire year on the streaming service. From May 4 through 12, the main English broadcast recorded an average of 57,000 concurrent viewers and an impressive six million hours watched.
The top broadcast for the event's English channel was on Saturday, when the main MDL channel had a recorded 1.4 million hours watched. The finals the following day saw 94,000 concurrent viewers. And that was just the English channel: The Russian channel averaged 109,000 CCV.
It seems that the MDL having its own Twitch channel has really paid off for Valve. Last year, the six-day Changsha tournament was covered remotely on Twitch by Beyond the Summit.
Time for a major change
Last year's The International marked the end of Valve's old Dota 2 schedule. The new professional circuit schedule now includes only five majors and five minors, respectively. This came after Valve realized that nine majors in one season was not quite practical, with three such events overlapping around the month of May last year.
The Changsha Major last year had been squished betwen the EPICENTER XL on April 27 through May 6, and the ESL One Birmingham 2018, which took place on May 23 through 27.
This year's schedule will be more evenly spread out, making it a lot easier for Twitch viewers to tune in to each match. Having the tournaments staggered apart makes each event its own focal point for that month, so Dota 2 fans can give each major their full attention.
Before the Disneyland Paris Major, Dota 2 had the DreamLeague Season 11 in March. The EPICENTER Major won't be taking place this year until the end of June.