Posted on September 4, 2025 · Updated on October 3, 2026

Minecraft Player Count & Sales Statistics (September 2026)

by Lou P.

Minecraft has sold more than 425 million copies, according to Xbox CEO Asha Sharma on September 26, 2026. The most recent official player count is 155 million monthly active users, which Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella called an all-time high on the company's October 29, 2025 earnings call.

Those are the two numbers most people are looking for. Everything else on this page comes with a date and a link to whoever said it first, because Minecraft stats go stale fast and a lot of the numbers floating around online can't be traced back to Microsoft or Mojang at all. Where something is an estimate rather than an official figure, we say so.

Latest official Minecraft figures

Last checked: September 28, 2026

Metric	Figure	Who said it	When
Copies sold (all platforms)	425 million+	Asha Sharma, Xbox CEO	Sep 26, 2026
Monthly active users	155 million (all-time high)	Satya Nadella, Microsoft FY26 Q1 earnings call	Oct 29, 2025
First-time players on an average day	300,000+	Asha Sharma, Xbox CEO	Sep 26, 2026
Weekly active users after the movie	Up 75%+ year over year	Microsoft FY25 Q3 earnings call	Apr 30, 2025
A Minecraft Movie worldwide box office	$960.4 million	Box Office Mojo (industry tracker)	Final gross
Price Microsoft paid for Mojang	$2.5 billion	Microsoft	Sep 15, 2014

How many people play Minecraft?

The official answer is 155 million people a month. Nadella gave that number on Microsoft's October 29, 2025 earnings call, covering the July to September 2025 quarter, and described it as an all-time high. As of late September 2026 Microsoft hasn't published a newer monthly figure.

A few things worth knowing about that number:

It's monthly active users, meaning people who played at least once in a month. It is not a count of people online at the same time.
Microsoft doesn't say how the number breaks down by platform, or whether players of the China-only edition run by NetEase are counted.
There is no official daily active user figure. The closest thing is the September 2026 statement that more than 300,000 people play Minecraft for the first time on an average day. That's new players only, not everyone who logs in.
There is no official concurrent (live) player count either. Sites that show a live number are estimating it.

Why other sites show 200 million+ players

If you've seen claims of 204, 212 or 222 million monthly players, those don't come from Microsoft. They're higher than the all-time high Microsoft itself reported in October 2025, and we couldn't trace them to any Microsoft or Mojang statement. Live-count sites are all over the place too: in late September 2026, the top-ranking trackers for "Minecraft player count" were showing monthly estimates anywhere from under 100 million to over 200 million for the same game. Treat any figure without a named source and a date as a guess.

Minecraft player count over time

These are the monthly active user figures Microsoft or Mojang have put on the record. Gaps are real: they didn't publish a number every year.

Period measured	Monthly active users	Source
December 2017	74 million	Mojang's Helen Chiang, reported by PC Gamer (Jan 21, 2018)
October 2018	91 million	Mojang, cited by VGC (Sep 16, 2019)
September 2019	112 million	Mojang via Business Insider, reported by VGC (Sep 16, 2019)
May 2020	126 million	Xbox Wire (May 18, 2020)
August 2021	141 million	Mojang at Minecraft Live 2021, reported by Windows Central (Oct 16, 2021)
April to June 2025	Record high (no number given)	Microsoft FY25 Q4 earnings call (Jul 30, 2025)
July to September 2025	155 million (all-time high)	Microsoft FY26 Q1 earnings call (Oct 29, 2025)

We couldn't find a new public monthly number from Microsoft or Mojang between the August 2021 figure and the record Microsoft mentioned in mid-2025. That gap is where most of the year-by-year figures you'll find on other sites were filled in, without a source.

How many copies has Minecraft sold?

More than 425 million, per Asha Sharma's post during Minecraft Live on September 26, 2026. Guinness World Records lists Minecraft as the best-selling video game of all time.

Here's how the official sales count has climbed:

Date stated	Copies sold	Source
June 2, 2016	106 million+	Microsoft and Mojang, reported by Fortune
January 2018	144 million	Mojang's Helen Chiang, reported by PC Gamer
May 2019	176 million	Mojang, 10th anniversary, reported by Game Informer
May 18, 2020	200 million+	Xbox Wire
October 2023	300 million+	Mojang's Helen Chiang at Minecraft Live, reported by Windows Central
April 2025	350 million+	Mojang, via the Official Minecraft Annual 2026, per Guinness World Records
September 26, 2026	425 million+	Asha Sharma, Xbox CEO

That's 75 million more copies between the April 2025 milestone and September 2026, a stretch that starts with the movie's release. Microsoft hasn't said how much of the increase came from the film, so we won't guess.

How much money has Minecraft made?

Nobody outside Microsoft knows exactly. Microsoft reports gaming revenue as a whole and doesn't publish a Minecraft line. Any "lifetime revenue" figure you see, whether it's $4 billion or $12 billion, is an outside estimate.

What is on the record:

Microsoft paid $2.5 billion for Mojang in 2014.
On its July 30, 2025 earnings call, Microsoft said Minecraft had record monthly active usage and record revenue that quarter, "thanks in large part to the success of the Minecraft movie." It didn't give a dollar figure.
At Minecraft Live 2021, Mojang said Marketplace creators had generated over $350 million in revenue (Windows Central, Oct 16, 2021). That's the latest official Marketplace number we could find.

The Minecraft movie effect

A Minecraft Movie opened in the US on April 4, 2025 and finished with $424.1 million domestic and $536.3 million international, for $960.4 million worldwide (Box Office Mojo). That's ticket sales, not money Microsoft booked.

The effect on the game shows up in Microsoft's own statements:

April 30, 2025: weekly active users up more than 75% year over year since the film's release (earnings call).
July 30, 2025: record monthly active usage and revenue for the quarter (earnings call).
October 29, 2025: 155 million monthly active users, an all-time high (earnings call).

Platforms

Minecraft comes in two main versions: Java Edition on PC, and Bedrock Edition on Windows, consoles and mobile. Microsoft doesn't publish player or sales numbers by platform, so any split you see elsewhere is an estimate.

Recent platform news from Minecraft Live on September 26, 2026:

Mojang announced Minecraft for Nintendo Switch 2 on October 27.
Minecraft Dungeons II launches September 29, 2026, and its new dimension, the Sift, comes to Java and Bedrock in 2027 (Xbox Wire).

We covered the spring 2026 announcements in our Minecraft Live 2026 recap.

Multiplayer and server stats

This is the part we deal with every day, and it's also where official data is thinnest. Microsoft and Mojang don't publish how many community servers exist or how many people play on them. What they have said:

In May 2020, Microsoft told The Verge that multiplayer sessions were up 40% as lockdowns hit (GeekWire).
Realms, Mojang's own subscription server, lets you play with up to 10 friends.

Past 10 friends you need a community or dedicated server. A vanilla server ships with max-players=20 in server.properties (Minecraft Wiki), and you can raise it as far as your hardware and network allow. For big public servers, trackers like Minetrack show live player counts. Those are real pings of specific servers, not estimates of Minecraft as a whole.

If you're sizing a server, our Minecraft server RAM guide walks through memory by player count and mod load, and the setup guide covers the rest. Or skip the hardware side entirely: Host Havoc Minecraft servers include DDoS protection, one-click Forge, Fabric and Paper installs, and Bedrock crossplay through Geyser.

Minecraft player demographics

Microsoft and Mojang don't publish an age or gender breakdown of Minecraft players. You'll see figures like "the average player is 24" on other stats pages, but we couldn't trace any of them to an official source or a published survey with a clear method, so we've left them out.

FAQ

How many people play Minecraft in 2026?

The latest official figure is 155 million monthly active users, reported by Microsoft on October 29, 2025. Microsoft hasn't published a newer monthly number as of September 28, 2026.

How many people play Minecraft every day?

Microsoft doesn't publish daily active users. It has said that more than 300,000 people play Minecraft for the first time on an average day (September 2026).

How many copies of Minecraft have been sold?

More than 425 million as of September 26, 2026, according to Xbox CEO Asha Sharma. It's the best-selling video game of all time.

Does Minecraft have 1 billion players?

There's no official figure that says so. The official numbers are 425 million+ copies sold and 155 million monthly players. Some copies are bought by the same person on more than one platform, so copies sold isn't the same as unique players either.

Is Minecraft still popular?

Yes. The October 2025 monthly player count was the highest Microsoft has ever reported, and the game was still pulling in 300,000+ first-time players a day in September 2026.