Average Age of Vanilla WoW players

WoW Classic WoW Classic General Discussion
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Myths and stereotypes are hard to debunk and one that is oft repeated is that the majority of Vanilla players were either unemployed, teenagers or both.

Yet, every last study I have been able to unearth pegs the average age of Vanilla players at 28 years old with the vast majority of that group being enrolled full time in University, fully employed and/or having family responsibilities.

There’s a 2018 study from Accenture regarding gaming that states only 19% of the gaming population is 17 years old or younger.

In their report from 2018, citing statistics from the Entertainment Software Association and USC Marshall School of Business report (2013) only 19% of the gaming population are males aged 17 or younger. Compare that to 31% of gamers being adult women.

While that study referred to all types of online games there have been several studies that also arrive at the same basic conclusion regarding MMO’s - that the average age of players of Vanilla WoW and continuing expansions is around 28 years old.

One of these studies was from Nick Yee’s Daedalus project. It did have some selection biases but the sample size was much more robust than the sample size in a typical National Election Poll that themselves have some selection issues but are considered accurate +/- 3 %, 19 times out of 20.

Another study by Yee from 2000-2003 involving MMO type gamers that pre-dates the release of Vanilla and involved over 30,000 people over a 3 year period determined that the age of the gamers was 26 years old. Since many of these players also became players of WoW and would have been older when Vanilla was released it provides further corroboration that the average age of Vanilla players was 28.

Lastly, a 2013 study from Statista found over 50% of WoW players were between the ages of 20-30.

It would be interesting to determine if Blizzard ever collected data that would have allowed them to determine player age accurately and if so would they be willing to release it or otherwise comment so we can finally, once and for all, debunk the stereotype that the majority of the player base are teenagers and/or no lifers playing in their parent’s basement.

(tried to include the links to each study but I’m not allowed to)

1 Like
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I wonder how long this took to put together lol.

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awhile… :slight_smile:

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The average age of gamers in general is in the mid-late thirties, so I wouldn’t be surprised.

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http://www.nickyee.com/daedalus/archives/001365.php

That has some interesting stats, prior to TBC.

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I didn’t read all of that, but I expect most of the Classic audience will be the same people who played the game back in like 2005 when we were teenagers, only we’re like 30 now.

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I played in 2004. I’m 41 now. Hopefully one of my kids will want to play too.

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I would have thought at least 33 but some users on this forum makes me think many were fetus’ during vanilla launch :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

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Very consicely put and well referenced post. Thank you for providing a good foundation for a conversation.

As to Blizzard, i have zero doubt they a ton of meta data on players going back 15 years. It would be poor business practice to not have it.

But for them to release any of that info ? … highly unlikely for multiple reasons. The big one being privacy concerns and the laws surrounding it, especially when you consider how global that data is and thus the many different laws surrounding the handling and publication of that data in any form. Theres simply to many differences in some countries for Blizzard to step into that minefield with no net benefit for doing so.

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I don’t remember ever putting in my age, so I suspect not.

Sorry, the people who don’t want to let go of the stereotype don’t care how many stereotypes and how much anecdotal evidence there is. They’d rather parrot “no gurlz on the interwebz” 4 lyfe.

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Would be interesting to find out the Alliance/Horde split as well. I always thought Horde players tended to be a bit younger as a group but no way to know for sure.

Oh, and one of our raid tanks in ZG was a 15 year old girl (yes, she talked in Vent so we were sure). Talk about breaking all the stereotypes.

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http://www.nickyee.com/daedalus/archives/001365.php

  • From the survey data, the average age of the WoW player is 28.3 (SD = 8.4). 84% of players are male. 16% are female. Female players are significantly older (M = 32.5, SD = 10.0) than male players (M = 28.0, SD = 8.4). On average, they spend 22.7 (SD = 14.1) hours per week playing WoW. There are no gender differences in hours played per week.

Overall, the demographic differences between Horde and Alliance characters are minimal. There are no gender differences. Male and female players are equally represented on both sides. There is a statistically significant, but substantively trivial, age difference. Players who prefer Horde characters (M = 27.5, SD = 8.0) tend to be slightly younger than players who prefer Alliance characters (M = 28.7, SD = 8.6).

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girl power ftw…