World Of Warcraft Hits 11 Million Subscribers Mark, Shows Signs Of Slowing

Gaming powerhouse Blizzard Entertainment has issued a press release announcing that the number of subscribers for World Of Warcraft has surpassed the 11 million mark.

For the record: subscribers include individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft, as well as those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access.

The milestone for the popular MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) represents a 10% growth in 10 months and shows signs of slowing. If you consider the fact that the online game debuted in November 2004 and took only six months to go from 9 million to 10 million subscribers, you can conclude that it took Blizzard much longer to add this last million subscribers to its user base than in the past (the company announced it reached the 10 million mark in January 2008, up from 9 million in July, 2007).

On the other hand, WoW was estimated to hold an impressive 62% of the massively multiplayer online game market back in April.

On 13 November, the second expansion of WoW, dubbed “Wrath of the Lich King”, will launch in several regions around the world. Maybe that will help reignite growth, or at least help it hold onto its massive lead in market share.