Is Minecraft esports going to blow up in 2025?

Minecraft Speed-running Ranked (MCSR) has been making the rounds this week as the Season 7 playoffs run from May 3rd to 11th, 2025.

During this time, the series has attracted strong viewership, signalling that perhaps 2025 is the year for Minecraft esports to take centre stage.

Speed running has always been popular in Minecraft, and MCSR brings the activity into a competitive tournament format. Top speed-runners go head-to-head in a race to defeat the Ender-dragon in Minecraft as quickly as possible, all on the same seed/world.

The MCSR mod, which eventually evolved into the tournament it is today, was developed around 2023 and quickly gained traction within the speed-running community.

The tournament is primarily owned by mod developers RedLime and OliverMCSR, and is often hosted by creators such as Matthew ‘Feinberg’ Feinberg and Anthony ‘Couriway’ Salzarulo, who recently posted online about its success.

“Minecraft esports is the future,” Couriway said online in response to the day two playoffs. “This is everything, what a day of ranked matches!”

This is the current prize pool of MCSR Season 7 playoffs

It begins with a round of 16, before the winners of eight matches move on to compete in the quarterfinals, semi-finals, third place and the grand finals.

On the official MCSR YouTube channel, the Season 7 Playoffs Day 2 livestream garnered over 28,000 views, and Day 1 got over 13,000 views.

“Shoutout mods, commentators, design, production, refs, backers, devs, everyone who made this amazing event possible,” said one user in the comments. “This was the most cinema-ranked of all time. I didn’t think ranked could get any better, but you guys just outdo yourselves season after season. Shoutout ranked, shoutout MCSR!”

On Twitch, viewership is even more impressive. The same matches were livestreamed on Feinberg’s official channel, and attracted over 75,000 views for Day 2, and 40,000 views for Day 1.

According to Esports Charts, Minecraft had a successful esports scene in 2024, recording a total prize pool of nearly $2m (~£1.62m). Furthermore, it reached an all-time peak viewership of over 510,000 users during Twitch Rivals, one of 22 events held that year.

Data on 2025 is limited, however if MCSR is anything to go by, the scene has seen no sign of slowing down. The tournament is still ongoing as of writing, so viewership may very well increase as the competition head closer to the grand finals.