Steam is the biggest digital store for PC games, and it continues to grow every year. A new report now reveals that 2025 was one of Steam’s strongest years ever, with the platform finishing the year on a record-breaking note.

According to the report from Alinea Analytics, December 2025 became Steam’s highest-earning December to date. With more than 100 million players active on the platform, Steam generated an estimated $1.6 billion in gross revenue in December alone. This marks a 22.7% increase compared to December 2024 and is also higher than December 2020 (during the pandemic), which was previously Steam’s best holiday month, when revenue reached about $1.4 billion.

Seasonal sales on Steam hit a new record high

The holiday season clearly played a major role. Seasonal sales, discounts, and new releases helped push spending higher during the final weeks of the year. The period between December 21 and January 4 turned out to be especially important, as several major games saw huge sales during those two weeks – namely the Steam Winter Sale.

One of the biggest standouts was ARC Raiders. During that holiday window, ARC Raiders became the top-selling game on Steam by copies sold, moving around 1.2 million units. While it ranked first in sales volume, it placed second in revenue during the same period, earning around $32 million. The top revenue spot once again went to Counter-Strike 2, which continues to dominate Steam’s charts via microtransactions (the game itself is free to play). Interestingly, more than half of ARC Raider’s sales in January were for on PC, Steam specifically, while PS5 and Xbox Series X/S sales sat at 25.5% and 21.0%, respectively.

Over the holiday weekend, the game passed 12 million copies sold across all platforms, with 7 million of those sales coming from Steam. Earlier in December, daily sales had started to slow down, but a 20% discount, combined with the holiday boost, quickly changed that. On Boxing Day alone, the game sold 250,000 copies, showing just how strong demand became.

Player activity also hit new highs. Winter updates helped keep existing players engaged while bringing in new recruits. At one point during the holidays, ARC Raiders reached its highest daily active player count ever, with nearly 3.2 million players online across all platforms, and more than half of them playing through Steam.

About the Author

Abdul Haddi

Abdul is a tech writer and Editor for PC Guide, specializing in all things tech, gaming, and hardware.