The Civilization franchise is officially more popular than ever. In less than two weeks since its October release, Civilization VI has reached 1 million units sold.

“Civilization VI is the fastest-selling title in the history of the series and is exceeding our expectations, with sell-in already surpassing 1 million units, “said Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick during the quarterly earnings report.

Civilization VI is a PC and Steam-only title. This means you can see the stats for yourself via Steamspy, which confirms the data. As of November 10, that number has reached over 1.1 million.

The day after release peak concurrent players reached over 150,000 players. Those numbers have since leveled out, but Civ VI remains among the most played games on Steam with 40-50,000 players at any one time. That puts it up there with veteran AAA stalwarts Grand Theft Auto V and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and indie survival game ARK: Survival Evolved.

Interestingly the previous installment, Civilization V, remains among the top ten most played games on Steam. The 2010 best-selling title still enjoys between 20-30,000 players. Civ V’s longevity is due in large part to well-received expansion packs, post-launch updates and patches, and a vibrant modding community. Fans are obviously hoping all of these features will transition to Civilization VI.

Civilization VI has an 89 Metacritic score (67 reviews), with many declaring it the best Civ game ever made. Pixelkin’s Nicole Tanner called it a “must buy for Civ fans” in her review.


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Eric has been writing for over nine years with bylines at Dicebreaker, Pixelkin, Polygon, PC Gamer, Tabletop Gaming magazine, and more covering movies, TV shows, video games, tabletop games, and tech. He reviews and live streams D&D adventures every week on his YouTube channel. He also makes a mean tuna quesadilla.