Battlefield 6 Dethrones Call of Duty on Steam: 700K+ Players Within Hours of Launch
Despite skepticism after EAs recent missteps, Battlefield 6 roared out of the gates on October 10, surging within hours and signaling a thunderous return for the franchise.
Battlefield 6 just did the thing a lot of people said it wouldn’t: it launched, it held together, and it immediately smoked Call of Duty on Steam. Not by a hair, either.
The number that matters
Battlefield 6 went live on October 10, 2025 and, within hours, hit a peak of 747,000 concurrent players on Steam. That tops its own beta high-water mark and leaps past Call of Duty’s all-time Steam peak. And no, there’s no Game Pass boost in that number. This is pure Steam traffic, with console players not even counted.
How that stacks up to Call of Duty
SteamDB shows the combined Call of Duty app reached its best-ever Steam peak at 491,000 concurrent players in 2022, right when Warzone 2.0 launched. Since then, the series has slipped. The 2024 release, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, did perk things up a bit with a 306,000 peak on Steam, but that’s still miles short of the Warzone 2.0 era. So when Battlefield 6 arrived and blasted to 747,000 within hours, it didn’t just edge out Black Ops 6 — it cleared the entire franchise’s all-time Steam record.
Again, that 747,000 doesn’t include Xbox or PlayStation. On Steam alone, Battlefield 6 is one of the most-played games right now. For once, Call of Duty actually has a fight on its hands, and it is losing this round badly.
Why players are jumping ship
Yes, it helps that EA finally shipped a Battlefield that, at least at launch, seems to land with players. But the other half of this is Activision’s recent track record. In the 2.9 years since that 491,000 peak, there have been three new Call of Duty releases, and only Black Ops 6 even sniffed the old high. The criticism isn’t complicated: too many recycled ideas, campaigns that feel like an afterthought, and multiplayer that rarely adds anything meaningfully new.
On top of that, there’s the constant headache of cheaters and hackers, and a microtransaction situation that feels baked into every corner of the experience — all while the base game still runs about $70. If you’re wondering why people are quick to try the other big military shooter, that’s your answer.
Put bluntly, this is what chasing short-term gains looks like when the audience notices. If nothing changes soon, you don’t have to squint too hard to imagine Microsoft eventually asking some hard questions about the future of the franchise.
Quick hits
- Battlefield 6 launch: October 10, 2025
- Steam peak within hours: 747,000 concurrent players
- Call of Duty all-time Steam peak (combined app): 491,000 during Warzone 2.0’s 2022 launch
- Black Ops 6 (2024) Steam peak: 306,000
- Battlefield 6’s 747,000 does not include Xbox/PlayStation
- No Game Pass lift baked into Battlefield 6’s Steam numbers
- Game name: Battlefield 6 | Developer: Battlefield Studios | Release: 2025