There is no single Steam revenue figure that tells you what you will earn as an indie developer. A game’s sales, a studio’s profit and an employee’s salary answer different questions. The sources discussed here do not establish a current median income for indie developers, so they should not be used to promise one.

Market revenue is not average launch revenue

Dividing annual indie market revenue by the number of games released that year mixes two different groups. The revenue includes older games; the release count does not.

VG Insights’ 2024 Global Indie Games Market Report illustrates the problem. With data as of September 30, 2024, it estimated that games released before 2024 accounted for 43% of indie revenue that year. That is catalog revenue, not money earned by that year’s new releases.

The report covers estimated full-game revenue on Steam, excluding DLC and microtransactions. Its revenue figures include Steam’s share and account for currencies, returns and discounts. They are analyst estimates, not a developer’s bank receipts.

Source and methodology: https://vginsights.com/assets/reports/VGI_Global_Indie_Games_Market_Report_2024.pdf 

Ask what the number actually measures

A mean divides revenue by the number of games in the sample. A median is the middle result when those games are ordered by revenue. A few large hits can move the mean without changing what the middle game earned.

Neither number is useful for your plan unless you know the period, the games included and the exclusions. Lifetime revenue is not first-year revenue. A sample that excludes games below a sales threshold does not describe every release.

Do not turn a per-game statistic into a developer salary. One person may work on several games, and one game may pay several people over several years.

A revenue milestone is not a wage

Keep three numbers separate when planning a release:

• Game sales revenue: check the source’s definition, including how it treats discounts, refunds, taxes and the store’s share.
• Receipts available to your business: the amount payable after applicable store deductions and contractual splits. A publisher agreement may include recoupment before you receive a share.
• Profit: what remains after the business’s costs. Contractors, software, marketing and the cost of your own work belong in the plan.

Even if you know a game’s gross revenue, dividing it by the team size does not establish what each developer took home. You still need the costs, agreements and period that revenue funded.

Team size does not guarantee a revenue tier

VG Insights groups indie games into segments, but its report calls the relationship between segment size and performance a rule of thumb. The segment revenue chart also excludes games below 2,000 units sold.

That makes the chart unsuitable for predicting what an arbitrary solo developer or small team will earn. A category describing successful games is not a promise that hiring enough people puts your game in that category.

The report’s qualifications matter as much as its totals: https://vginsights.com/assets/reports/VGI_Global_Indie_Games_Market_Report_2024.pdf 

Treat a sales forecast as an assumption

Separate what you have measured from what you hope will happen. A wishlist count is not a purchase count, and another game’s launch results are not your conversion rate.

Write down a low, middle and high sales case, with the assumptions behind each. Include the time those receipts need to cover. If the project only works in the high case, decide what you can cut or fund another way before committing the budget.

Run the numbers before you quit your job

Here is a hypothetical breakeven calculation, not an earnings forecast. Suppose you need to recover $30,000 in costs and expect $6 per paid copy to contribute toward those costs after all applicable deductions and per-sale costs:

$30,000 ÷ $6 = 5,000 paid copies to break even.

If the contribution is $4 instead, you need 7,500 copies. Neither result estimates how many people will buy the game. It tells you what the project needs under those assumptions.

Include your living costs or planned pay in the budget if the game must support you while you make it. Keep personal taxes and business obligations in the plan too. A budget that counts only software and assets does not answer whether you can afford to work on the game full-time.

The bottom line

Use market reports to understand the market, not to assign yourself a salary. For your own project, the useful questions are how much you can afford to spend, what remains from each sale and how many sales those assumptions require.

Published by the Ziva.sh team. https://ziva.sh