The PC remains the most popular gaming platform, at least among game developers in North America and Europe.

Each year, the Game Developers Conference polls thousands of developers and publishes the "State of the Game Industry" report, which the GDC has conducted for the past eight years to help identify current trends and shifting interests among game developers worldwide. The 2021 poll data from over 3,000 game developers shows the current state of PC gaming and the good news for its future.

According to the GDC poll, 58% of game developers chose PC when asked which platform they are most interested in as developers today. Since poll respondents were allowed to choose multiple options, developers could choose as many platforms as they wanted. However, the results show that the PC leads all other platforms when it comes to developer interest.

The same percentage (58%) indicated that their most recent project was released on PC and that their current project is planned for PC. On the other hand, 53% indicated that their next project is also being developed for the PC. While I don't think we've had to worry too much about the PC as a platform for at least the last decade or so (although the ridiculous notion that "PC gaming is dying" still circulates from time to time), it's always nice to have a little data to reinforce our belief that the PC is the best platform for gaming. It's always nice to have a little bit of data that reinforces the belief that the PC is the best platform for gaming.

Comparing 2021 to last year's poll results, 50% of responding developers said they are most interested in the PC as a platform in 2020, a slight increase.

Coming in second in the 2021 poll and leading the consoles in terms of developer interest is the PlayStation 5, chosen by 44% of developers, followed by the Nintendo Switch (38%) and Xbox Series X/S (30%). only 6% expressed interest in developing for Google's streaming platform.

The poll also shows a slight decline when it comes to VR and AR: the percentage of developers working on VR or AR games dropped from 46% in 2020 to 38% in 2021. However, Oculus Quest was chosen as the VR platform of most interest by 52% of developers polled.

The demographics of the developers polled are noteworthy: most were based in North America (57%) and Europe (26%), with only 8% in Asia, 5% in South America, 2% in Australia and New Zealand, and 1% in Africa Since the GDC is based in the U.S., this very Western-centric poll; if more developers in other regions were surveyed, the results might be quite different.