Highlights
- ARC Raiders has retained approximately 91% of its peak Steam player base months after launch.
- Battlefield 6 has seen an estimated 85% drop from its launch peak.
- The gap highlights a clear divide in live-service player retention in 2025.
ARC Raiders has retained roughly 91% of its Steam player base months after launch, according to SteamDB data, positioning it as one of 2025’s strongest live-service performers. Over the same period, Battlefield 6 has lost an estimated 85% of its launch audience, highlighting a sharp split in post-release engagement.
As of the latest snapshot, ARC Raiders is hovering around an average of 200K active players, a 24-hour peak of 428,579, and an all-time peak of 481,966 reached about two months ago in mid-November 2025. Comparing those figures indicates that the game has held onto almost all of its peak audience well beyond launch, a result most live-service multiplayer games struggle to achieve.
The performance stands out even in a year that included major critical winners such as Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. While awards attention focused elsewhere, ARC Raiders has exceeded expectations on sustained player count and engagement rather than relying on a short-lived debut surge.
Battlefield 6, released in mid-October 2025, roughly two weeks before ARC Raiders, shows the opposite trajectory. The shooter reached an all-time peak of 747,440 concurrent players roughly three months ago in October 2025. Current data shows an average of 50K players active and a 24-hour peak of 119,894.
The gap between those figures represents an estimated 85% decline from its launch high, despite the game being pretty well-received at debut when compared with Battlefield 2042.
ARC Raiders Player Retention Sets a Live-Service Benchmark
Both titles are live-service PvP games, making retention a core success metric rather than one tied to campaign completion.
Another comparison is Marvel Rivals, which peaked at around 644K concurrent players before dropping to less than half within two months, later stabilizing around 100K nightly concurrents. Battlefield 6 currently sits near that range, though Marvel Rivals has been live for over a year.
ARC Raiders has supported retention with rapid post-launch updates, including a winter update adding weather systems, new gear, and quality-of-life changes. While some tapering is expected over time, daily peaks between 390K and 440K remain uncommon.
The game’s results also raise questions ahead of Bungie’s Marathon, due in early March 2025, as ARC Raiders has broadened interest in extraction shooters and set a benchmark that may shape expectations for the genre’s next major release.
