UK: The growing interest in crypto among esports fans

Purchase intent of cryptocurrency among the United Kingdom’s esports fans has substantially increased in the past 12 months, YouGov consumer data shows.

The proportion of esports fans who tell us they’re very likely, likely or somewhat likely to use cryptocurrency in the next 12 months has increased by ten points – equating to a 21% increase (47% in 2021 vs. 57% in 2022).

While that’s certainly a notable increase, the proportion of the general UK population likely to use crypto has increased by close to 64% (from 11% to 18%).

This large gulf between esports fans and the general public is not entirely unsurprising. Esports fans are, generally speaking, young, tech-savvy, and willing to take risks, as are those familiar with blockchain technology.

This group is nearly three times as likely as the general population to see cryptos to be the future of online transactions (52% vs. 18%) and six times more likely to be willing to give up their bank account and use crypto instead (37% vs. 6%).

Meanwhile, YouGov data also shows which cryptocurrencies are most popular with esports fans. After Bitcoin (which 6% of this audience say they’ve used), 4% say they’ve used Monero, while 4% have used Ethereum (4%), which is also popular for creating non-fungible tokens.

There remains plenty of partnership opportunities for esports brands in the crypto space as investments increase. We’ll conclude with one additional insight that may be useful for crypto advertisers. Esports fans are more likely than the general population to see financial matters as confusing (52% vs. 36%). Marketers may want to think about ways to boost the confidence of this young audience when speaking to them.

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Methodology: YouGov Profiles is based on continuously collected data and rolling surveys, rather than from a single limited questionnaire. Profiles data is nationally representative and weighted by age, gender, education, region, and race. Learn more about Profiles.