EA Sports FC 24 nets 11 million players in opening week

Within its first week of release, EA Sports FC 24 has gotten off to a strong start, player-wise. Electronic Arts revealed the sports game has seen 11.3 million players since its September 29 release on PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Xbox One. 

EA Sports FC 24 is the publisher's first soccer game without the FIFA branding, and it's been known since 2022 the games would have the EA Sports moniker going forward. While this doesn't translate directly to sales, the player count shows that if nothing else, audiences weren't confused (or turned away) by the name change. 

"In addition to welcoming back millions of our longtime players, new players in FC 24 are up nearly 20 percent year-over-year," wrote EA Sports president Cam Weber. "We are building the world’s biggest football community through EA Sports FC, and we’re just getting started.”

There was similar success for EA Sports FC Mobile, which also launched in late September. Within its first day, the mobile game saw 2.2 million downloads (which already broke records for the mobile franchise) and 11.2 million downloads within its first 10 days.

"We’re thrilled to have so many fans jumping into The World’s Game in both EA SPORTS FC 24 and FC Mobile in just the first few days since launch," continued Weber. 

Sports is an important part of EA's game

Much like 2K's baseball and basketball franchises are important to that developer, football and American football are vital parts of EA's business. The FIFA series was a great revenue driver for the developer in previous years, even as CEO Andrew Wilson claimed the name was keeping the franchise from its full potential. 

Back then, Wilson indicated that FIFA wouldn't allow the developers to iterate on the formula, which has understandably caused some fatigue over the years. Prior to FC 24's release, both EA and The Premier League called the game "a significant evolution" from the FIFA titles.

And EA clearly wanted this game to feel like a fresh start in more ways than one: ahead of FC 24's release, it delisted the last decade's worth of FIFA games.

Going forward, the developer will still release sports games that have specific brandings attached to them, such as Madden and F1. Others such as UFC and the upcoming college football game will have "EA Sports" at the front of the title to help audiences further associate the sport with EA.