What game to stream and when, depending on your region (October 2026)

Updated October 9, 2026. This page is refreshed every month.

You're wondering what time to go live and what game to play. Fair question, but most answers you'll find online rest on nothing you can check. This guide sorts it out: what is measured, what isn't, what the numbers say region by region, and how to find your own slot in ten minutes with the official tools.

One thing before we start: this is about the time you go live. The time you post a clip is a different question, covered in our article on the best time to post your clips.

The truth about "the best time to stream"

There is no reliable public data on live audiences hour by hour and by region. LiveReacting put it bluntly on August 16, 2026: "There is no citable public source for hour-by-hour Twitch concurrency by region." That data exists, but behind paid tools (Streams Charts PRO, Stream Hatchet), and TwitchTracker forbids scraping its pages.

The direct consequence: the "stream at 6 PM" advice you read elsewhere rests on no public data. No solid public study measures how small channels grow depending on the time they stream, either. The few studies that exist are old, qualitative, or cover a handful of channels.

What we do know

1. There are fewer viewers per channel than in 2023. The ratio below is calculated from the averages published by TwitchTracker, across all of Twitch.

TwitchTracker draws the conclusion itself: "Declining amount viewers per one live channel (ratio on the chart) makes it harder for a novice streamer to get out of the bottom of a directory and get noticed."

2. Outside peak hours, channels seem to drop faster than viewers. Two one-off readings point that way. They are two isolated moments, an illustration and not proof:

• Saturday, August 15, 2026 at 13:12 UTC, a reading published by LiveReacting: viewers down 1.2% and channels down 23.3% compared with the 24-hour average;
• Friday, October 9, 2026 around 9:40 UTC, a reading on TwitchTracker: 1,391,417 viewers for 49,410 channels, about 28.2 viewers per channel, against a 7-day average of 23.7.

3. Twitch says so itself. In its Creator Camp, Twitch writes: "Category popularity on Twitch fluctuates throughout the day, month, and year, so it's important to choose a category that suits you and your style best."

The advice you can draw from this, and it is advice, not a measured law: look for the hours when competition drops faster than your category's audience. That's exactly what the official tools let you see.

Find your time slot in 10 minutes

On Twitch: the Time to Stream tool

Twitch offers a free tool, "Time to Stream", in the Research part of the Creator Dashboard's Analytics (Twitch's official help). Step by step:

1. Open your Creator Dashboard, then Analytics, then Research, and choose "Time to Stream".
2. The tool shows, by hour and by day, viewers, live channels and the number of viewers per channel.
3. Filter on your viewers' region, your category and your language. Pick the period: 7 or 28 days.
4. Spot the hours with the most viewers per channel for your category and your language. These are candidates, not certainties.
5. Keep the one you can hold every week. Twitch insists on consistency (see below).

On YouTube: the "When your viewers are on YouTube" report

YouTube describes this report in its official help: "This report shows you when your viewers are online across YouTube in the last 28 days. You can use it to help build your community, understand when to schedule a Premiere, or to plan your next live stream."

Step by step:

1. Open your channel analytics and find the "When your viewers are on YouTube" report (the official help explains where it is).
2. Spot the time ranges when your viewers are most online.
3. Start your live at the beginning of one of those ranges, and keep the same one every week.

Mind what the report measures: it shows when your viewers are on YouTube, not specifically when they watch live streams.

On Kick

We found no official Kick help on choosing a streaming time. If you multistream, rely on Twitch's and YouTube's tools, and on your own results.

Look at the median, not the average

Average viewers per channel, including the ones in this guide, are pulled up by big channels. To get a sense of what an ordinary streamer gets in a category, look instead at the median TwitchTracker publishes on its "to-stream" page.

If your audience lives in another time zone

The advice is simple: stream at your audience's hours, not yours. A qualitative study presented at the DiGRA conference in 2023, for example, describes Australian streamers who target the American audience by streaming in the morning. In Time to Stream, filter on that audience's region rather than your own.

Region by region

A warning before the table: the "viewers per channel" column is a 7-day average, read on TwitchTracker on October 9, 2026, and a calculation (average viewers divided by average channels). It follows the stream's declared language, not the viewer's country, and big channels pull it up: it doesn't describe what a small streamer gets.

France and French-speaking audiences

In France, Twitch remains the center of livestreaming: among the top 500 multistreamers, it accounts for 82.69% of hours watched in H1 2026, according to Streams Charts. French-language Twitch averages 132,062 viewers for 4,448 live channels (7 days to October 9, 2026, TwitchTracker), about 29.7 viewers per channel: more than English, Spanish or Portuguese. The 10 biggest French-language channels account for about 18% of the week's watch time. No French peak hour is published, and no recent sourced ranking of French categories exists: your hour is in Time to Stream, filtering on your viewers' region and language.

Spain

In Spain, Twitch leads: 7 of the 10 biggest Spanish streamers of 2025 broadcast on Twitch only, including Ibai with 66.3 million hours watched, according to Streams Charts. Kick still accounts for 29.51% of hours among the biggest Spanish multistreamers in H1 2026. Strong categories are football (Kings League, EA FC), esports (LEC), gaming and IRL. Spanish-language Twitch, Spain and Latin America combined, averages 130,801 viewers for 7,530 channels, about 17.4 viewers per channel: the lowest ratio among the major languages. The 10 biggest Spanish-language channels account for about 20% of watch time.

Latin America

In Spanish-speaking Latin America, Kick dominates: 7 of the 10 biggest Latin American streamers of 2025 broadcast there, including WestCol with 57.31 million hours watched, according to Streams Charts. Mexico is the exception, with YouTube. Strong categories are Just Chatting, IRL, Dota 2, GTA V, Minecraft, Roblox and boxing events: Stream Fighters 4, held in Bogotá on October 18, 2025, peaked at 4,600,683 concurrent viewers on Kick (Streams Charts).

Brazil

Brazil is the world's 3rd largest livestreaming market outside China, behind the United States and India, with "just under 9% of worldwide viewership" and more than 60% of the South American audience; an active viewer there watches 87 minutes of live content per day on average, according to Streams Charts. The peaks of the 10 biggest Brazilian streamers of 2025 all happened on YouTube (Streams Charts), and Kick accounts for 25.74% of hours among the biggest multistreamers. Portuguese-language Twitch averages 99,504 viewers for 5,091 channels, about 19.5 per channel, and the audience there is not very concentrated: the 10 biggest channels account for about 10% of watch time, against 18% in French. Strong categories are sports (football), news, talk shows and music, then gaming and esports: Counter-Strike (Gaules, 95.5 million hours across three platforms) and GTA RP (Coringa, PaulinhoLOKO). With the 2026 World Cup, CazéTV passed one billion hours watched on YouTube in Q2 2026.

North America

No peak hour is published by region for North America. For the United States, Streams Charts sums it up as "Diversified, but still Twitch-led". English-language Twitch, all countries combined, averages 1,059,938 viewers for 52,031 channels, about 20.4 viewers per channel. English accounts for about 49% of Twitch viewers but 57% of channels: there are proportionally more streamers than viewers. In Time to Stream, filter on your audience's region rather than relying on an average hour.

Japan

In Japan, YouTube Gaming leads live gaming with 59.8% in Q1 2026, ahead of Twitch (about 33%) and Kick (7.1%), according to Stream Hatchet. Japanese-language Twitch averages 131,270 viewers for 3,623 channels, about 36.2 viewers per channel, the highest ratio of the languages in this guide. From March 2025 to February 2026, the most watched games were GTA V (230 million hours), League of Legends (132.6 million), VALORANT (131.3 million), Street Fighter 6 (127.9 million), Minecraft (122.5 million) and Monster Hunter Wilds (57.6 million). VTubers hold 5 of the top 10 spots in Stream Hatchet's ranking.

South Korea

In South Korea, Twitch is no longer available: the service shut down on February 27, 2024 (Korean time), with Twitch explaining that its network fees there were "10 times more expensive than in most other countries" (Twitch blog). Korean livestreaming happens on SOOP and CHZZK; in Q2 2026, CHZZK was "close to SOOP in total Hours Watched" (Streams Charts). In 2024, SOOP was driven by League of Legends (195 million hours), Minecraft (139 million) and StarCraft (125 million), and CHZZK by GTA V (26 million), VALORANT (17 million) and WoW (14 million), according to Stream Hatchet (2024 data).

India

In India, "The livestreaming industry in India remains dominated by YouTube Live", according to Streams Charts. The country is the world's 2nd largest livestreaming market outside China, according to another Streams Charts analysis. Hindi-language Twitch is marginal there: about 100 viewers for 18 channels on average. Strong categories are religion, sports (cricket), gaming (BGMI), politics and education.

What game, and when

For choosing the game itself, category by category, read our sister article: What games to stream on Twitch in October 2026. Here we look at the calendar: when a release or an event changes the competition.

A release brings in as many streamers as viewers

Two recent examples show how it works:

• Hytale, released in early access in January 2026, passed 441,000 concurrent viewers on Twitch on day one. But more than 25,000 different creators streamed it, and the audience dropped after two days: "launch-driven hype cooled" (Streams Charts).
• Hollow Knight: Silksong, over its first week: 19 million hours watched, a peak of 512,000 viewers and 842,000 hours streamed, 72.2% of it on Twitch (Stream Hatchet). Rough calculation: about 22.6 viewers per hour streamed, roughly the Twitch average. Careful, these numbers cover several platforms.

So a big release brings viewers, but it brings just as many streamers. No public study measures its effect on small channels. Twitch puts it this way: "Be mindful of other events that create competition that may detract from your own." (Creator Camp)

Our cautious advice: on the day of a very big release, you're one name among thousands in the category. If it's your game, play it for your community, without counting on the directory to get you discovered. Otherwise, pick a less crowded category that day, and check in Time to Stream how the number of viewers per channel moved.

Calendar, October to December 2026

What this calendar can change for you, as advice:

• GTA VI, November 19. GTA V was already Twitch's most-watched game in September 2026, with 76.7 million hours watched (+59%). Expect a very crowded GTA VI category in the first days. Also note you'll need a PS5 or an Xbox Series to play it: no PC version is announced.
• WoW Forever, November 4. WoW almost doubled its hours watched on Twitch in September 2026 (53.4 million). If you stream WoW, the launch lands at 11 PM UTC: check in Time to Stream whether your audience is there at that hour or the next day.
• Modern Warfare 4, October 23. Expect a crowded Call of Duty category around launch. If you already stream Call of Duty, this is your moment; otherwise, don't switch just to ride the wave: Twitch advises playing what you enjoy rather than what's trending (see below).
• Worlds, October 15 to November 14. Matches are played in the United States (Los Angeles, Allen, Brooklyn), so the big nights land at different hours depending on your region. If you stream League of Legends, watch how your category moves on match days.
• Steam Scream V, October 26 to November 2. A week dedicated to horror on Steam: a chance to try a horror game if that's your style.
• The CS2 Major, November 25 to December 13, and The Game Awards, December 10. Two events that concentrate attention: avoid them for an important launch, use them if you already do Counter-Strike or gaming news.

What Twitch officially recommends

The scheduling advice in Twitch's Creator Camp comes down to one word: consistency. Here it is, word for word.

On timing (Engaging viewers):

"Viewers prefer watching content that is provided on a regular basis. Consistent timing creates anticipation and excitement for your content. Set a regular streaming schedule - even if it's just a few hours a week. Foster community growth by encouraging viewing traditions and creating recurring segments. This way, your viewers will know when to find you online!"

On your schedule (Growing your community):

"Share a schedule and post when you're live to help viewers know when to come to stream."

On choosing a game (Gaming), a category Twitch says accounts for "approximately 80% of all content on Twitch":

"When planning gaming content, it's important to strike a balance. Consider matching games to your skill set, current gaming trends, popular titles, and your own interests."

"TWITCH TIP: If you play a variety of games, set a schedule so viewers know what you're playing on which day."

"Play what you enjoy and avoid forcing yourself to play a game that you may not enjoy solely because it's trending."

And on focusing on a single game, Twitch notes: "This often results in faster growth and a more passionate audience with a common language."

Getting seen outside your live hours

Your live only lasts a few hours; the rest of the week, your clips can do the work for you. StreamClipping AI, the AI clipping software for streamers, turns a Twitch, YouTube or Kick VOD, or a live in progress, into subtitled 9:16 vertical clips, and can publish them automatically to TikTok, Shorts and Reels (AutoPilot, on the Pro and Elite plans). A clip plays out fast: in StreamClipping AI's study of clip publications, a clip gets a median 95% of its 30-day views within its first 24 hours.

Sources

Readings from October 9, 2026, unless stated otherwise.

• TwitchTracker: global statistics, languages, median by category
• Streams Charts: multistreaming audience split, H1 2026, Q2 2026 global livestreaming landscape, 2025 viewership records
• Stream Hatchet: Japan, South Korea
• Twitch: Research help, Creator Camp, Korea announcement
• YouTube: "When your viewers are on YouTube" help

Made with love, by a streamer for stream lovers. Ragnarlebroc.