Apex Legends Sets New Record for Players with Season 9 Launch

The free-to-play title Apex Legends has been building steam for a while. Now, the launch of Season 9 has helped the game set a new record for its concurrent players on Steam.

Over on Twitter, Communications director Ryan Rigney revealed the actual numbers. Apex Legends reached 304,263 concurrent players on Steam this morning. However, as of the time of this writing a new record has already been set. SteamDB.info lists an all-time peak of 313,839 players, set seven hours ago.

These are just public Steam API numbers by the way, not all platforms.

Source: https://t.co/mKAIwBhS0b
— Ryan K. Rigney (@RKRigney) May 5, 2021

Generally speaking, this is great news for developers and players alike. But there were a few flies in the ointment. The influx of new and returning players caused some major server issues yesterday, and some of those issues continue today.

Update: We're seeing steady improvements throughout the day.

Also note that some items received through Twitch (e.g. ALGS trackers, badges, etc.) are temporarily turned off as we attempt to alleviate load on backend services. This is temporary, so you'll get those items back.
— Respawn (@Respawn) May 5, 2021

But those issues will get ironed out soon enough. And whether you’ve never played the game or put it down long ago, this is a great time to jump in. The new season patches Lifeline, adds cool new weapons like the compound bow, and devs even added a permanent deathmatch mode called Arenas.

It’s a great time to check out these new features. And based on these numbers, you’ll have plenty of people to play with!