Agar.io is a quirky game that has gained a massive audience in part because you can easily play it against so many other people at once. The mobile and PC game starts you out as a tiny bacteria cell (Agar refers to the substance that scientists use to create bacteria cultures). The goal is to swallow other cells without larger ones swallowing you. It’s a total Darwinian game, with lots of hilarious results as players try to outmaneuver each other.
And now Agar.io has hit a big milestone. It has reached 2 billion views on YouTube. A total of 21 other game franchises have generated that many views on YouTube. Most of them are blockbuster games like Call of Duty. But Agar.io, released as a simple 2D game in 2015, is one of the rare indie titles to get there.
The title was created by Matheus Valadares and published by Miniclip. The game caught visibility in part thanks to one of the stars of the Agar.io world, Jumbo, who started by uploading one Agar.io gameplay video every week. In less than seven months, it became one of the fastest channels to reach a million subscribers in the history of YouTube.
