Palworld 1.0 Passes 850,000 Steam Players After Full Launch

Palworld 1.0 has pulled a massive crowd back to Steam, with Pocketpair's survival game climbing above 850,000 concurrent players after leaving early access.

Steam Charts recorded a 24-hour peak of 855,459 players for Palworld on Sunday, July 12. That is far short of the game's all-time Steam high of 2,101,535 players from its explosive January 2024 early access launch, but it still puts the full release in rare territory for a paid Steam game two and a half years later.

The surge follows the arrival of Palworld 1.0, which moved the game out of early access with 72 new Pals, Sunreach, the World Tree and sweeping changes to combat, bases, multiplayer and progression. Pocketpair's official changelog says the update brings the total Pal count to 287, raises the player level cap from 65 to 80 and adds new systems called Awakening and Mutation.

Palworld's full launch is drawing early access players back

The current Steam peak suggests the 1.0 update did more than create a short curiosity bump. Palworld averaged 72,797 players over the last 30 days on Steam Charts, up from 26,856 in June, with the July peak now sitting at more than 16 times June's high of 51,116.

That does not include players on console or subscription services. Palworld is also available on PlayStation 5 and Xbox, including Xbox Game Pass, but Pocketpair has not announced comparable player numbers for those platforms.

The timing helps explain the return. Palworld's full release landed after more than two years in early access, and Pocketpair used version 1.0 to reshape large parts of the game instead of simply removing the early access label. Recent Gamers Now coverage already tracked the update's long build-up, including the Palworld 1.0 launch time and Pocketpair's note that players could keep old saves even though starting fresh was recommended.

Palworld also remains cheaper than many full-release survival games. Its Steam page lists the game at $29.99, with a 30% launch discount currently bringing it to $20.99.

Pocketpair is still dealing with Nintendo's lawsuit over elements of Palworld, and the 1.0 update arrived after earlier gameplay changes tied to that dispute. The Steam numbers show that legal backdrop has not stopped a major return of players, at least on PC, as the game begins its post-early-access life.