RRQ recorded a 44% year-over-year increase in Hours Watched at the Esports World Cup (EWC) 2026 compared with EWC 2025, according to data and analysis from Esports Charts.
The result is particularly notable because RRQ Hoshi, RRQ’s Mobile Legends: Bang Bang division and historically one of the organization’s biggest viewership drivers, did not qualify for EWC 2026 in Paris.
Even without MLBB, RRQ still competed across five titles at the event: PUBG Mobile, Free Fire, Apex Legends, VALORANT, and TrackMania.
Across the EWC 2026 main event, RRQ was attributed 18,449,197 Hours Watched, with 804,934 Peak Viewers and 319,467 Average Viewers. The numbers are significant. But as with most esports viewership data, they also need context.
Also read: RRQ Hoshi Remains the Heartbeat of MPL Indonesia Viewership in S17
Growth Without RRQ Hoshi
According to Artyom Odintsov, Co-founder and CEO of Esports Charts, RRQ’s year-over-year growth was one of the most notable takeaways from the organization’s EWC 2026 campaign.
“RRQ’s Hours Watched at EWC 2026 grew by 44% year-over-year compared with EWC 2025, marking a significant increase in the total viewing volume generated around the organization, while Peak Viewers declined compared with last year,” said Artyom.
In simple terms, the total amount of viewing time attributed to RRQ increased significantly compared with the previous year, even though Peak Viewers declined.
For RRQ, that is an important distinction.
For years, the organization has been strongly associated with RRQ Hoshi and the enormous Mobile Legends community in Indonesia. EWC 2026 presented a very different situation: RRQ entered one of the world’s largest multi-title esports events without one of its most-watched divisions.
Yet the RRQ name still remained visible across several major esports ecosystems.
PUBG Mobile Became RRQ’s Biggest Viewership Contributor
Among the five titles RRQ competed in, PUBG Mobile accounted for the largest share of Hours Watched at 46.7%.
Free Fire followed with 28%, while Apex Legends contributed 24.2%. VALORANT and TrackMania accounted for 0.8% and 0.3%, respectively.
According to Esports Charts, one of the main reasons behind PUBG Mobile’s large contribution was simply the scale of the PUBG Mobile World Cup 2026.
The tournament was the second-most-watched event at EWC 2026 by Hours Watched, giving participating organizations the opportunity to accumulate substantial viewing volume.
However, this is also where esports viewership becomes more complicated.
Battle Royale Viewership Does Not Mean Every Viewer Was Watching RRQ
Traditional head-to-head esports usually feature two teams competing directly against each other. Battle royale works differently.
Multiple teams share the same lobby and the same broadcast at the same time. Because of that, viewership from a single round cannot be cleanly separated based on which team each viewer was specifically following.
“The Hours Watched generated by a round are attributed across all teams in the lobby, making it impossible to isolate the exact share contributed by any individual team,” Artyom explained.
This means the Hours Watched attributed to RRQ in PUBG Mobile, Free Fire, and Apex Legends should not be interpreted as time spent exclusively watching RRQ.
Some of that viewing time naturally comes from audiences following the tournament as a whole, including other teams competing in the same lobby.That context matters because 98.9% of RRQ’s total Hours Watched at EWC 2026 came from those three battle royale titles.
In other words, Hours Watched is useful for understanding exposure, but it should not automatically be treated as a direct ranking of organizational popularity.
RRQ Ranked Fourth in Southeast Asia, But the Context Matters
Based on Esports Charts’ methodology, RRQ ranked 21st globally in Hours Watched across EWC 2026, both when qualification stages were included and when looking only at the main event.
Among Southeast Asian organizations, RRQ ranked fourth, behind eArena, Yangon Galacticos, and Bigetron Esports. That ranking, however, should not be read as a definitive list of the most popular esports organizations in Southeast Asia.
Different organizations competed in different games, with different tournament lengths, formats, match counts, and viewership structures.
For that reason, the ranking is better understood as a picture of how much exposure each organization received across EWC 2026, rather than an absolute measure of fanbase size or brand popularity.
Why Was Hindi RRQ’s Most-Watched Language?
Another surprising result came from language distribution. Hindi accounted for the largest share of RRQ’s Hours Watched at EWC 2026, at 19.8%.
For an Indonesian esports organization, that may seem unexpected at first. But according to Artyom, the explanation is closely tied to the two titles that contributed most heavily to RRQ’s viewership.
“Hindi emerged as RRQ’s leading viewing language, reflecting the strong Hindi audience around PUBG Mobile and Free Fire,” said Artyom.
Together, PUBG Mobile and Free Fire accounted for 74.7% of RRQ’s Hours Watched at the EWC 2026 main event. Hindi was also the leading viewing language for both tournaments.
Co-streaming played a major role as well. One of the biggest contributors was Snax Gaming, an unofficial co-streamer with a significant Hindi-speaking audience.
At the PUBG Mobile World Cup 2026, Snax Gaming generated 77.7% of all Hindi Hours Watched and ranked as the most-watched channel of the entire tournament.
At Free Fire EWC 2026, Snax Gaming contributed 26.6% of Hindi Hours Watched, ranking first among Hindi-language channels and second overall.
So the result does not necessarily mean RRQ suddenly had a majority-Indian audience. Instead, it reflects the combination of the games RRQ competed in, the size of those tournaments, and the broadcast and co-streaming ecosystems surrounding them.
EWC 2026 Showed That RRQ Has More Than One Path to Global Exposure
The most important takeaway from EWC 2026 is not whether RRQ can claim to be the most-watched organization based on a single metric.
It is that RRQ was still able to generate significant international exposure across multiple titles without RRQ Hoshi and Mobile Legends.
PUBG Mobile, Free Fire, and Apex Legends became the main drivers of RRQ’s viewership throughout the event, while VALORANT and TrackMania extended the organization’s presence into different competitive communities.
The 44% year-over-year increase in Hours Watched also reflects a broader RRQ presence across multiple esports divisions. That does not mean Mobile Legends has become any less important to RRQ. Far from it.
RRQ Hoshi remains one of the most recognizable parts of the organization and one of its strongest connections to millions of fans. But EWC 2026 showed something else as well.
Even without Hoshi on the stage, RRQ was still there — across different games, different audiences, and different parts of the global esports community. And for an organization continuing to build its identity beyond a single title, that may be one of the most meaningful results of all.