Battlefield 6 Open Beta is officially the series’ most played game on Steam, having reached a peak concurrent player count of 521,079 during its first weekend.
The first Battlefield 6 Open Beta weekend took place from August 9 to August 10, letting players with an early access code play the next entry in EA’s long-running FPS series ahead of its release on October 10, 2025.
On August 9, the open beta reached a peak concurrent player count of 521,079, currently making it the 18th most popular Steam game by all-time peak player count, surpassing Call of Duty.
In an X post on August 8, Former Blizzard Entertainment president Mike Ybarra predicted this year’s Battlefield “will boot stomp CoD,” before going on to describe Call of Duty as a “mess” in his replies.
“The real win here is CoD won’t be lazy anymore, and we’ll all get better FPS games for it,” Ybarra wrote.
EA has also broken its own record, as this marks the highest concurrent player count of any Battlefield game on Steam, quadrupling Battlefield 2042’s peak count of 107,376 almost two years ago.
It’s worth noting, however, that EA withheld most of its games from Steam, including the Battlefield series, between 2011 and 2020, and instead made them available on the EA App (previously called Origin).
In 2020, EA began reintroducing its games, including the Battlefield series, to Valve’s storefront. But EA’s period away from Steam means that while we can compare the concurrent player count of 2021’s Battlefield 2042 and Battlefield 6 Open Beta, we can’t compare the Steam (specifically) launch numbers of the recent beta to any entries released during that time, including popular entries Battlefield 1 and Battlefield 5.
“This is Battlefield’s biggest Open Beta ever,” EA wrote in an X post on August 9, when the open beta had surpassed roughly 400,000 concurrent players.
“Peak time is approaching and queues will be expected. We’re working on entry times to the game, but appreciate your patience as you wait for your time to arrive.
“We want everyone to experience a smooth and fair Open Beta, including those currently within the game too.
“Thank you for your continued excitement for Battlefield 6’s Open Beta!”
