Team Vitality won IEM Katowice with their Grand Finals match reaching almost 1.3 million peak viewers.
The Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) Katowice Grand Finals saw Team Vitality win the trophy after a phenomenal performance against Team Spirit. Counter-Strike fans were in for a treat, watching Mathieu "ZywOo" Herbaut step up for the team when it mattered the most. The Grand Finals of the IEM Katowice 2025 saw a peak viewership of 1.29 million viewers, even though the series ended with the shortest possible number of maps. It was a 3-0 victory for Team Vitality.
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IEM Katowice's peak viewership reaches nearly 1.3 million viewers
The Team Spirit vs Vitality match had a peak viewership of 1,299,747 — just shy of the 1.3 million number. The largest chunk of viewership included 573,383 peak English viewers. Other languages such as Russian also accounted for a significant chunk of viewership at 386,845 peak viewers. The series lasted just three maps, and it could’ve reached a higher number had Team Spirit put up a better fight and won a few maps. It broke the record for the semifinal match between Team Spirit at NAVI that was at 1,036,326 peak viewers.
The Grand Finals was the second match in the tournament that crossed a million viewers. The first match to cross six digits was the semifinal match between NAVI and Team Spirit. Despite NAVI being the clear crowd favorite, Team Spirit won the series to set up their appearance in the Grand Finals. It set up the Zyw0o vs Danil "donk" Kryshkovets matchup in the Grand Finals. Unfortunately for Team Spirit supporters, Zyw0o took the win this time around. Team Spirit was the reigning champion of IEM Katowice having won the event in 2024.
"IEM Katowice 2025 saw a 33.7% increase in peak viewership compared to last year, with the average number of viewers rising by 32.6%. The key factor behind the growth was the increase in broadcast channels, which went up from 108 to 153 — a 41.6% jump. Viewership grew across all major languages, including English, Russian, and Portuguese."
The tournament had more than 30 million hours watched at 30,667,137 hours. The event started on Jan. 29 and came to an end on Feb. 9. The Grand Finals was the only series in the entire tournament that was a best-of-five (Bo5) series.
Team Vitality won IEM Katowice following a 3-0 victory over Team Spirit. Spirit was unable to reach double digits on Dust 2 and Nuke, while they had 11 rounds on Mirage. With this victory, Team Vitality won $400,000 in prize money, while Spirit went home with $180,000 but with a mind for revenge on Vitality in their next matchup.
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