Roblox vs Fortnite in numbers - which one is at the top in 2024?

• Roblox and Fortnite have rapidly become two of the most popular games in the world
• Millions of players duke it out in battle royales or make their way through various experiences
• But who's coming out on top? Let's find out...

Updated by Iwan Morris on February 22nd, 2024 - added new information to reflect the 2023 stats

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With millions of daily users, Roblox and Fortnite are two of the most popular games on the planet.

Roblox is a sort of game-creation platform where you take your custom-made character through stand-alone games called ‘experiences’. These can range from puzzles and shooters to social deduction games. After first being released in 2006 it remained somewhat less well-known, until the outbreak of the Covid pandemic drove new players online in droves, and with thousands of experiences to choose from, Roblox offered the escape they wanted.

Meanwhile, Fortnite is THE battle-royale game, which took the world by storm back in 2017 and has since gone from strength to strength as one of the most popular games on the planet. While the core gameplay of building structures, as you attempt to survive a brutal hundred-player battle, is part of its core appeal, thanks to a combination of being free (like Roblox) and numerous brand collaborations alongside a strong presence from content creators the game has seen meteoric growth.

But which is best?

While it’s hard to make a direct comparison of which is ‘better’ - given how different they are - it’s still interesting to look at how they’ve both grown over the years. Both are multiplatform, on everything from PC to mobile and both Xbox and Playstation, and both have heavy creative elements that fuel a die-hard community.

But how do they measure up in some of the most important metrics? Well, let’s find out and put these two games to the test!

Total Users

Actually tracking the number of users can be difficult. Most sources only reveal third-party estimates, as Epic Games only infrequently reveals milestones that it’s hit with the last official statement being when Fortnite broke 400 million registered users in 2020.

But, let’s compare the results from one single source, analytics firm Datasage. In terms of monthly active users for Fortnite, data from December 2023 indicates that this number hovers at around 236 million users. Total registered users are estimated to be around 500 million now, which is a fairly likely - if conservative - estimate.

Roblox meanwhile boasts a slightly smaller but still significant 216 monthly active users. This is despite the fact that Roblox has by far the largest number of users on paper at a whopping 4.6 billion registered accounts. However, many of these may be now inactive, never used or simply created for purposes other than playing.

Revenue

In terms of revenue the same sources as cite a lifetime total of $26 billion for Fortnite, consistent with most reports. Fortnite’s yearly record was estimated at a whopping $6bn in 2022, which would stand as its all time highest followed by $5.8bn in 2021. Before Fortnite was removed from the iOS and Google Play app stores it was estimated to have accrued $1.1bn in revenue.

Roblox, meanwhile, boasted $2.04bn in revenue in the first three quarters of 2023 alone. Assuming it followed this trend into the latter part of the year it would easily have it outstrip Fortnite in yearly revenue. Although this shouldn’t be unexpected given the much greater ease of incorporating microtransactions into the various experiences, and the cut that Roblox takes from individual creators.

Engagement

During 2023, Roblox is estimated to have had over 58 billion hours of total playtime. With Q1 2023 at 14.4 billion compared to 11.8 billion in Q1 2021. All of which indicates tremendous growth, and can likely be attributed to the vast variety of experiences available that appeal to many different demographics.

Solid numbers for Fortnite aren’t easily available. However, we can find that with the release of the OG season that returned many older map elements and more there was a significant boost. User engagement went from 600 million hours in October to 1.6 billion in November.

So, if we extrapolate and do some - admittedly completely bonkers maths - we might come out with 9.2 billion hours for 2023 in total. This would be significantly lower than Roblox, but again that assumes that every month before October was roughly the same.

Either way, a significant discrepancy in engagement between what is solely a battle-royale game and a game-creation platform with numerous different experiences shouldn’t be surprising.

Hours Watched

Fortnite was once the most watched game on streaming services back in 2020 with 1.5 billion hours watched. This dipped down to 1.1 billion in 2021 and the most recent estimates for 2022 put it at 738 million. It indicates a gradual but noticeable decline in engagement with the game, at least as far as viewership is concerned.

Roblox brings in around 857,000 hours watched each week on Twitch, at around 44 million hours per year if we do some rough maths. It should be noted that Twitch Tracker, the site this data is from, actually puts Fortnite’s numbers at a lower 295,000 hours watched, which would equal 15 million with the same calculation.

It should, of course, be clarified that the statistics from Twitch Tracker are solely related to Twitch itself and don’t take into account other streaming outlets. Hence why Business of Apps’ estimate is much higher for 2022. Sadly they don’t have statistics available for Roblox, so an exact comparison is difficult.

But assuming that Roblox does indeed come out on top overall, it presents some obvious takeaways. One advantage Roblox has is the sheer variety of experiences means that players can seek out a streamer covering an experience from multiple genres, meanwhile, Fortnite has only recently diversified its game mode lineup with additions like Fortnite Festival.

Age Demographics

Fortnite’s age demographics have increased slightly, with 62% of its players being between the ages of 18-24 (up from 60%) while 22% are between 25 and 34 years old. The slight rise in the number of 18-24 year old players since we last covered these statistics could be indicative of a growing audience ‘ageing into’ the game over time.

Roblox meanwhile features ages 9-12 as the largest portion of their user base at 23%, while those under 9 years of age came second at 22% and players aged 17-24 years made up 21%. This discrepancy, with those between 13-16 years making up the lowest range, could be attributed to the prevalence of child-focused experiences, and the rise of more complex adult-oriented experiences like shooters which are only appropriate for older players.

Gender Demographics

Roblox has a surprisingly even distribution of gender demographics, with 51% being male and 40% female. There is also a 9% discrepancy of those who identified as neither. But it suggests a relatively broad audience for the game.

Fortnite is mainly for the dudes it seems, with 89% of players being male versus only 10% being female. Other sources indicate it has a slightly more varied range with 72% male and 27% female, suggesting there is some variation between those being polled.

Platform Stats

A whopping 78% of Roblox players originate on mobile, with only 20% on desktop and a mere 1% on console. This is especially interesting as Roblox, of course, originated on desktop before it blew up massively during the Covid pandemic.

As for Fortnite the most recent solid statistics come from 2018, with the PlayStation 4 as the most popular platform for gamers at 42% while Xbox One players made up 35% of the player base and 13% of the group were PC players. Mobile rounded things out at around 9%.

It’s worth noting that Fortnite allegedly missed out on 72 million players thanks to the iOS ban. Indicating that, were that number to continue to increase it may have a significant mobile presence too, but likely nowhere near Roblox.

Conclusion

Overall, it's quite tough to see if either Roblox or Fortnite is the top game. Roblox has much more monthly activity than Fortnite does, which is a huge point for Roblox. However, Fortnite does check other boxes such as having over 350 million registered users overall and making more money. Another thing that goes in Fortnite's favour is that it's among the most watched games ever on Twitch, YouTube, and Facebook. 

Roblox does have another impressive number on its sleeve that may give it an edge, and that's the nearly 12 billion hours of playtime. Between this and the aforementioned monthly active users of over 200 million, Roblox's engagement numbers are through the roof. However, factoring in things like watch time and revenue, Fortnite may have the edge in this fascinating battle of two gaming titans.