MOST PLAYED MMOs 2024 - sorted by active players

In this video we go over the most played MMOs and rank them in order of active player base sizes. The most popular MMO will be ranked #1 and the least Popular on the list is ranked at #14. Even the least popular MMO is incredibly popular as there are dozens more than rank even lower than those on this list. All of these are or have been worth playing at some point or another, though some of these MMORPGs are far from their prime today. Enjoy!

We talk about Eve Online, Star Wars: The Old Republic (SWTOR), Albion Online, New World, Guild Wars 2 (GW2), RuneScape (RS3), MapleStory, Elder Scrolls Online (ESO), Black Desert Online (BDO), Lost Ark, WoW Classic, Classic WOW, Old School RuneScape (OSRS), Final Fantasy 14 (FF14), and World of Warcraft (WOW)

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0:00 Most Played MMOs Right Now
0:26 Eve Online
3:39 Star Wars: The Old Republic (SWTOR)
5:52 Albion Online
6:55 New World
7:54 Guild Wars 2 (GW2)
9:51 RuneScape (RS3)
11:32 MapleStory
12:40 Elder Scrolls Online (ESO)
14:17 Black Desert Online (BDO)
15:52 Lost Ark
18:03 WoW Classic
20:02 Old School RuneScape (OSRS)
22:39 Final Fantasy 14 (FF14)
24:37 World of Warcraft (WOW)
26:41 Final Thoughts

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Disclaimer: Raid: Shadow Legends Christmas Tale Promotion. Entry is Open to legal residents of THE 50 UNITED STATES AND THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA (excluding New York and Florida), or of UNITED KINGDOM who are 18 years or older. VOID WHERE PROHIBITED. Open only to NEW users with a valid Player ID that downloaded Raid: Shadow Legends and opened a Game Account after November 1st, 2023.

[dustintapp]

I really want to play a brand new MMO that does things right. No pay to win, modern graphics and gameplay.

[True_Blood_]

The fact WOW has held 1st place for over 20 years is a testament, not how good the game is, but rather how neglected the MMO genre is.

[imurked]

Playing RuneScape on Java in homeroom and computer class was such a blast back in the day. Good memories indeed

[betholiver]

I've played Guild Wars 2 since its release at twelve years old. If any of you are looking for not just very involved gameplay, lemme say this now. There is a huge and thriving roleplay community there too. Yes, I actually said *roleplay*. I'm a part of it on the NA side. There's just as large a community on the EU side. And if you're looking for a vet's experience of the game itself, like I said, I was 12 when I started in Guild Wars 2. I'm 23 now and I still love it. That should say some stuff. Hell, I'll replay story just for the hell of it, that's how much it means to me.

[The.Great.And.Powerful.Trixie]

Still play SWTOR, but mostly for the story and other solo content. Used to raid a bit, but nowadays I often dont have time or even mood. In my opinion, SWTOR is primarily "single" player story RPG, wrapped in MMO. I think that if somebody is big Star Wars fan, they should definitely try it. In many aspects its something of a copy of WoW, (combat for example, classes/specs) so if you played WoW, you should feel like at home. Also many players like to joke that apart from stories, fashion is the true content, to which I must say, I never had so much fun just collecting outfits, and dressing up my characters, in any other game, because you can see your fancy outfits in story cutscenes, where you character stands and moves in various poses, makes expressions, fights...
Group content like raiding is still quite decent and there are active raiding guilds, and its often no problem to find people spamming LFG, and PvP is also pretty fun

[traveling.down.the.road]

Guild Wars 2 should be much higher than number ten on this list, but it rarely gets any meaningful marketing and attention.

[investor]

10k hr in FFXIV, 8k hr in GW2 100% ruined my life 😂

[DevahBluJasmine]

Glad to see GW2 on the list. As someone who's played since 2 weeks after launch and with over 30k hours invested, it has held my attention for over 10 years now. I tried BnS, Archage, and a few others, but I always come back to GW2, in large part because there's no sub fee, and once you buy the expansions, you have the content permanently unlocked. Not to mention, there is no traditional questing like "Do A to get to B" type situation that many games have, and this game promotes exploration and makes it fun.

[danielfreitas]

Switched from WoW to GW2 a long time ago. Came back to GW2 after a year and resumed right from where I left off.

It is one of the great things about the game. Now with the expansion, there’s more QoL stuff to unlock and I can’t wait to finish my current objectives before I hop on the new content. This feeling of not missing out is really good and allows you to pace yourself, especially as we grow older and have kids 😂.

[vutalol]

Gw2 would thrive on console if they ported

[gurkengerd]

Basing the population of a game on the searches of the title on google is .. highly questionable to say the least. We are used to higher quality in your videos than that. Very disappointed.

[fwabble]

If GW2 had controller support it would be up - I adore ESO, and with good reason, but GW2 is absolutely a masterwork IMO, but falls short in accessibility, ESO has full and excellent controller support on all platforms - this is huge. Both games are outlandishly good in their own ways but only having PC/mouse support is a huge bugger

[hellfiremech]

Awesome video as always. i would like to add something else to the OSRS portion that i feel you missed. Ive played alot of mmos and OSRS has got to have one of the best wiki's of any game i have ever played. The wiki support team is on top of it and has so many guides and more information then most mmos combined.

[SolFaithman]

Nexon, who make Maple Story, have been fined $9m for manipulating the drop/success rate of the loot boxes in the game and also stating a max level upgrade was available as a possible drop but game actually had zero chance of dropping said advertised upgrade.

[lilrozak]

there's no way there's more ppl in ESO than GW2 right? holy smokes ESO puttin in work

[TurkeysliceGamez]

I play runescape but you can’t google trends as you have to google damn near everything in that game, an 8 hour play time can equal 100-200 searches depending on what your doing

[ikingipapa]

that new world music hits. makes me want to hop back in. hope it has something big in the future but sadly i doubt it

[otakuofmine]

on a positive note: i am glad ESO could recover that well this year, it shows they come back when listening after such a down.
big 3 are hard to crack rn, but if they for once could sort out their pvp quality (and maybe finally drop the old consols for that among other reasons), i could see it get on 6-4 even, if everything else fits as well.

[lukanic]

I switch between Albion, Maplestory and WoW when big patches come out and it keep me entertained for whole year.

[tw]

Amazed GW2 is not higher, have played wow, lotro, ff14 etc and i can honestly say GW2 does some things better than all of them (such as open world)