Ready, get set, game: How gaming is faring in the UAE

Ready, get set, game: How gaming is faring in the UAE

We take a look at the evolution of the region as a hub of gaming and eSports and speak to gamers and business professionals from the field

Published: Sun 24 Jul 2022, 1:33 PM Last updated: Sun 24 Jul 2022, 1:40 PM

Did you know? The United Arab Emirates has the highest number of adult gamers in 2022, a new global survey has found.

Statista, a German database company, interviewed 45,650 people from 39 countries between April 2021 and March 2022 as part of their Global Consumer Survey to find out about the gaming practices among people aged above 18. 1,012 Emiratis and residents took part, and 91 per cent said they were gamers, out of which 73 per cent played games on their mobile phones.

That doesn’t come as a surprise given the fact that there are countless entertaining mobile games for everyone. Be it the widely popular battle royale game PUBG Mobile, which has gained a lot of fans in the last 5 years, strategic role-playing games (RPG) like Clash of Clans, or the highly addictive puzzle game Candy Crush Saga.

In a metropolis like Dubai, there is an average of 1.3 million people using public transportation on a daily basis, as per