Banana Game Sees Sharp Decline in Steam Players

After reaching its peak in June 2024, Banana on Steam has experienced a significant decline in concurrent players. Dive into the details of its rise to fame and subsequent drop in popularity.

Banana Game Steam Charts Show Massive Decline

It’s a Clicker Game About Bananas…

For those new to Banana, it's a free-to-play clicker game that breaks traditional gaming molds. The core gameplay involves clicking a banana image repeatedly. However, its appeal stems from the potential to earn financial rewards. Players can collect virtual banana items and sell them on the Steam Community Market, with rare items like the "Special Golden Banana" fetching prices as high as $1,378.58.

The game's rapid ascent can be attributed to several key factors. The promise of earning Steam Wallet funds with minimal effort initially attracted a large player base. Developer Hery described the game as a "legal 'Infinite money glitch'" in a June 2024 interview with Polygon. However, this surge also drew automated bots aiming to farm valuable drops, artificially inflating player counts.

"Unfortunately, we are currently facing some problems around botting, since the game takes basically 1% to no resources of your PC," Hery told Polygon. "People are abusing up to 1,000 alternative accounts in order to get Rarer drops or at least drops in bulk."

In response, the developers introduced bot prevention measures in May 2024. It remains unclear how many of the game's 100,000+ players are genuine. Following these measures, the game's concurrent player count saw a sharp decline. By July 2024, the average number of players dropped to 549,091, and this downward trend continued. November 2024 saw a significant drop from 400,000 to just over 100,000 players. Despite a brief increase at the start of 2025, the game has struggled to recover.

Currently, Banana maintains a strong presence with 112,966 concurrent players, ranking 7th on Steam's Most Played Games list. However, a sudden dip to around 50,000 players was observed on March 16th, 2025, between 17:00 and 23:00 UTC. The cause of this drop is not yet clear, and it's uncertain whether bots played a role. The overall trend suggests that the initial novelty of the game is fading.

The developers have been proactive, regularly updating the game with trading cards, event drops, and quality-of-life improvements. They've also engaged the community by integrating user-generated banana art through the Steam Workshop, allowing creators to earn a share of sales. Despite these efforts, it's uncertain whether Banana can regain its former glory without the influence of bots.