The first weekend of the Battlefield 6 Beta can surely be deemed a success. Its concurrent player count on Steam was in the hundreds of thousands off the jump, immediately surpassing Battlefield 2042. It then continued to rise to nearly half a million players, again, on Steam alone, and it eventually did pass half a million, even beating the highest concurrent player count of Call of Duty on Steam.
On that kind of popularity alone, it was a successful weekend. Adding the fact that the game's community seems to be on board with Battlefield 6 makes it an even bigger success. But it was also immediately successful in helping out Electronic Arts as a whole.
Spotted by MP1st, the Battlefield 6 beta helped spike EA's stocks, with share prices rising 4.7%, it's largest increase since the end of last month. EA shares were trading at $176.11 a share thanks to this rise, giving EA an estimated $42 billion evaluation.
It's alltogether a strong start for the series return and its attempt to bring back what used to be an annual bout between Call of Duty and Battlefield, where both sides had nearly equal footing in the shooter space as both series tried capturing players attention. It's unfortunately been a one-sided fight in recent years, with Battlefield barely able to hold a candle to the kinds of numbers Call of Duty is capable of.
This is the first time in what feels like a long time that Battlefield has the chance to take back its slice of the pie that Call of Duty had subsumed. We'll see how this next beta weekend goes, which at the time of this writing is due to start tomorrow, August 14, and run until Sunday, August 17. After that, it'll be a long stretch to October when the game is set to launch.
Hopefully, Battlefield 6 is able to stick the landing, and carry this momentum all the way to a strong launch and an even stronger first year.
About the author: David has been writing about videogames, technology, and culture since 2020, with a focus on reporting daily news across multiple publications, including GameDaily.Biz, GameSkinny, and PlayStation Universe before joining Wccftech in 2025. David started contributing as Canada/US reporter for Wccftech's gaming section in 2025. Besides being up-to-date on the industry's movements, he loves interviewing developers, reviewing games, and writing intricate essays about the symbolism and layered meanings to be found in rich narratives as he's done for publications like GamesIndustry.Biz, LostInCult, and others. Outside of games he loves movies, music, theatre, his hometown, and his family, though not necessarily in that order.
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