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Halo Infinite multiplayer nets over 270k concurrent players on Steam on first day

As Xbox and 343 Industries surprise-launched the multiplayer component of the game, it soared to the fourth most-played game on Steam in no time.

TJ Denzer

November 16, 2021 7:30 AM

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Xbox and 343 Industries certainly had a delightful surprise for Halo players and fans yesterday. Where no game announcements or reveals were expected during the Xbox 20th Anniversary Celebration, they suddenly launched Halo Infinite’s multiplayer in open beta without warning on PC and Xbox platforms. The game is available to download now and is free-to-play, and it garnered a massive influx of over 270,000 concurrent players in its first day of availability.

These numbers come to us from the Halo Infinite page on SteamDB, which give us a snapshot of what the game’s player count has looked like since it launched on November 15, 2021. According to the numbers, at around 6 p.m. PT / 9 p.m. ET, Halo Infinite peaked at a little over 272k concurrent players, making it the fourth highest player count on a Steam game at the time. It also had a Twitch viewer count of just under 247k people watching concurrently earlier in the day.

Halo Infinite’s multiplayer beta launch as part of the Xbox Anniversary festivities was certainly a delightful surprise. The campaign still has us a bit skeptical due to things like co-op being delayed, but the multiplayer has been a fine experience in previous technical tests. And with 343 Industries launching Seasons to give more context and rewards to the multiplayer experience, there’s something even further to get in on as Season 1 launched as well.

The Version 1.0 experience of Halo Infinite is set to launch in December, but given the launch of the first Season, it seems likely that this multiplayer beta will coast right into the game’s full launch. It will remain to be seen if there are any resets, but we would hardly expect rewards to be taken away from players at this point. Nonetheless, stay tuned as we continue to follow for all of the latest Halo Infinite updates and new details.

TJ Denzer

Senior News Editor

TJ Denzer is a player and writer with a passion for games that has dominated a lifetime. He found his way to the Shacknews roster in late 2019 and has worked his way to Senior News Editor since. Between news coverage, he also aides notably in livestream projects like the indie game-focused Indie-licious, the Shacknews Stimulus Games, and the Shacknews Dump. You can reach him at tj.denzer@shacknews.com and also find him on Twitter @JohnnyChugs.