Gaming disorder statistics worldwide

Updated October 2026

Most people who play video games do so without problems. Gaming disorder is uncommon: a global review put it at about 3.0% of people in the studies it pooled ¹. The key figures below come from that review, from the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children survey, which runs with the WHO Regional Office for Europe, and from studies in East Asia.

For that small share of people, gaming takes over: they lose control over how much they play, put it ahead of other parts of life, and carry on despite clear harm. The World Health Organization recognises this pattern as gaming disorder in ICD-11, its international list of health conditions used for diagnosis.

Researchers still debate how best to measure gaming disorder, and figures vary widely with the screening tool, the threshold and who answers. Screening questionnaires flag possible problems, not diagnoses. Each figure below names its sample and method. Prevalence is the share of people with a condition at a given time. A meta-analysis, or pooled estimate, combines the results of many studies into one figure.

Getting help

If something on this page reflects what you are going through, you do not have to manage it alone. Our guide to finding the right therapist explains how to choose someone qualified, and the TherapyRoute directory lists therapists in many countries.

If you are in crisis or thinking about suicide, our list of helplines and crisis lines worldwide gives free services by country. In an emergency, call your local emergency number.

Gaming among young people

Gaming is part of most young people's lives. In European school surveys, most adolescents who play show no signs of problems, while a minority are at risk, more often boys than girls. A cut-off is the score on a questionnaire at which a person counts as likely to have a condition; it is not a diagnosis. A quota sample picks people to match the population on set traits, such as age and sex.

• In the European countries and regions where the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children survey could classify gaming, 16% of boys were at risk of problematic gaming in 2021/2022. (survey, at one point in time, 2021/2022 data) ²
• In the eleven European countries and regions where the HBSC school survey could classify gaming, 7% of girls aged eleven, thirteen and fifteen were at risk of problematic gaming in 2021/2022. (survey, at one point in time, 2021/2022 data) ²
• In the European countries and regions that asked about gaming in the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children survey, about a third of adolescents, 34%, played digital games every day in 2021/2022. (survey, at one point in time, 2021/2022 data) ²
• In the European countries and regions that asked about gaming in the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children survey, 22% of adolescents gamed for four hours or more on gaming days in 2021/2022. (survey, at one point in time, 2021/2022 data) ²
• Among the countries where the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children survey could classify gaming, the share of adolescents at risk of problematic gaming was highest in Malta, at 19%, in 2021/2022. (survey, at one point in time, 2021/2022 data) ²
• Among the European countries with gaming data in the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children survey, the share of adolescents at risk of problematic gaming was lowest in the Netherlands, at 5%, in 2021/2022. (survey, at one point in time, 2021/2022 data) ²
• In the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children, 53% of boys aged twelve to thirteen played video games daily. (survey, at one point in time, 2012-2016 data) ⁵
• In the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children, 36% of girls aged twelve to thirteen played video games daily, a share that fell as they grew older. (survey, at one point in time, 2012-2016 data) ⁵
• In an online quota sample of adults in Germany in 2025, 59.2% had played computer games in the past year. (survey, past 12 months, 2025 data) ⁶
• In a national school survey in Saudi Arabia, 82.2% of middle and high school students played video games. (survey, at one point in time, 2021–2022 data) ⁷
• In Azerbaijan, 16.1% of adolescents who game, aged eleven to sixteen, showed problematic gaming in a school survey, the highest of the countries compared. (survey, at one point in time, 2017-2018 data) ⁸
• In England, 12.3% of adolescents who game, aged eleven to sixteen, showed problematic gaming in a school survey. (survey, at one point in time, 2017-2018 data) ⁸
• In the United States, 7.0% of screen-using adolescents aged eleven to twelve in a national multi-site cohort met the study's cutoff for problematic video game use. (cohort study, at one point in time, 2018-2020 data) ⁹

How common gaming disorder is

Studies of random samples of the general population find much lower rates than studies of students or people who already game a lot. How strictly researchers apply the criteria changes the count several times over. The DSM is the American Psychiatric Association's diagnostic manual. In the DSM-5-TR, the American Psychiatric Association lists internet gaming disorder among conditions recommended for further research, not as a formal diagnosis ¹⁰. The World Health Organization includes gaming disorder as a diagnosis in ICD-11 ¹⁰. A convenience sample consists of people who chose to take part.

Internet, smartphone and social media use

Problematic use of the internet, smartphones and social media overlaps with gaming problems. These figures rest mostly on screening questionnaires in student samples, and the evidence is weaker than for gaming disorder. A median is the middle value when you put the studies' rates in order.

• Across Europe, central Asia and Canada, 11% of adolescents reported problematic social media use in 2021/2022. (survey, at one point in time, 2021/2022 data) ²
• Across studies in seven African countries, mostly of students, the pooled rate of internet addiction on screening questionnaires was 40.3%; the review rated the certainty of this estimate as very low. (pooled from prevalence studies, at one point in time, published 2022) ²⁶
• Across studies in Iran, mostly of students, the pooled rate of internet addiction was 20%. (pooled from prevalence studies, at one point in time, published 2017) ²⁷
• Across the thirteen studies that reported it, in a review of mostly students in seven African countries, the pooled rate of severe internet addiction was 6.3%. (pooled from prevalence studies, at one point in time, published 2022) ²⁶
• Across studies of children and young people, the median rate of problematic smartphone use was 23.3%, about one in four. (meta-analysis of studies, at one point in time, published 2019) ²⁸

Who seeks help

The studies below show how many young people had sought help, and in Flanders how many knew where to find it. In New Zealand's publicly funded addiction and youth services, many clinicians screened without a standard tool.

• Among first-year students at five universities in Mexico who met internet gaming disorder criteria, 21.9% had ever had psychological or medical treatment. (survey, lifetime (ever), 2018-2019 data) ¹⁵
• Among adolescent gamers in Flanders, Belgium, 53.4% knew where they could seek help for gaming problems. (survey, at one point in time, published 2026, fieldwork year not stated) ²⁹
• Among adolescent gamers in Flanders, Belgium, only 3.5% had sought help for gaming problems. (survey, at one point in time, published 2026, fieldwork year not stated) ²⁹
• In an online survey of a convenience sample of governmental schools in northern Jordan, 36.7% of adolescents aged ten to seventeen with internet access had never received guidance on online gaming's harms. (survey, at one point in time, 2025 data) ³⁰
• At a specialist gaming clinic in Sweden, clinicians rated 69% of people aged twelve to forty-nine seeking treatment as having significant problems with daily functioning. (at one point in time, 2022-2024 data) ³¹
• At a specialist gaming clinic in Sweden, 37% of people aged twelve to forty-nine seeking treatment referred themselves, while parents referred most younger patients. (at one point in time, 2022-2024 data) ³¹
• In New Zealand's publicly funded addiction and youth services, 61.4% of clinicians who had seen an internet-addiction client mainly screened for gaming disorder by talking, without a set questionnaire. (survey, at one point in time, 2021 data) ³²
• Among clinicians in New Zealand's publicly funded addiction and youth services who had seen at least one client for an internet-enabled addiction, only 15.9% mainly used a standardised screening tool for gaming disorder. (survey, at one point in time, 2021 data) ³²

How to read these figures

Gaming disorder is a contested diagnosis. Researchers disagree about where heavy but healthy play ends and disorder begins, so figures depend heavily on the tool and threshold used.

Screening questionnaires flag possible problems. A clinical diagnosis requires significant harm to daily life, usually over at least a year, or sooner when the problems are severe.

Studies of students, gamers or online volunteers give higher figures than random samples of the population.

Playing a lot is not the same as having a disorder. Many people who play for hours each day have no problems.

If gaming is causing problems for you or your child, a psychologist or counsellor can help. Our guide on how to find the right therapist explains what to look for. If you are in distress right now, see our helplines and crisis lines worldwide.

Cite this page: TherapyRoute. Gaming disorder statistics worldwide. https://www.therapyroute.com/article/gaming-disorder-statistics-worldwide-by-therapyroute. Last updated 26 October 2026.

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