Dota 2 grows larger than World of Warcraft, but League of Legends still crushes both

Valve finally has as many players for its latest big hit as the long-running World of Warcraft … the only difference is that Valve’s game is free.

In the last month, the free-to-play Dota 2 has had 7.86 million players, according to Valve. That’s a huge milestone, as it means Valve’s multiplayer online battle arena game (MOBA) has surpassed Blizzard’s flagship. That massively multiplayer online hit currently has 7.8 million monthly active subscribers, according to the publisher’s last announcement. Of course, “subscribers” is very different from “players” as World of Warcraft still charges a $15 monthly fee to each of those players where Dota 2 is free with microtransactions. So while Dota 2’s popularity is on the rise, these numbers might reveal more about the long-lasting success of World of Warcraft than anything else.