How much revenue did Outer Wilds make?

$18.5M–$49.7M after Steam's roughly 30% cut, derived from the copies estimate and its price.

How many copies did Outer Wilds sell?

Q: How many copies did Outer Wilds sell?

2.7M to 4.4M copies, based on its 108k Steam reviews. This is a labeled estimate from the review count, not exact sales.

Estimated copies sold: ≈ 2.7M–4.4M; $18.5M–$49.7M after Steam's cut $33.6M–$76.4M before Steam's cut; from 108k reviews (Overwhelmingly Positive)

Copies are estimated from the public review count, adjusted for release year, and cross-checked against SteamSpy's own estimate.

Did the prediction match what actually happened?

We hid Outer Wilds and predicted how it would do from its 8 similar games. Every figure here, including Outer Wilds's, is estimated from Steam reviews.

Copies, estimated from reviews

typical (middle half) 335k–681k

best case 1.6M (Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader)

Games like Outer Wilds

A typical game among these

≈ 335k–681k copies

≈ $3.2M–$5.1M after Steam's cut

from ~10k reviews

Only the top fifth of 2019's Steam releases earned $34k or more before Steam's cut, so plan for that or less.

7 of the 8 similar games are hits.

No genre covers most of these similar games. The closest is Sci-fi (4 of 8), so its genre is hard to place.

Of the 416 indie games that passed 1,000 reviews in 2022, 11.8% were novel genre mixes and 88.2% stuck to an established genre. Published indie market research.

Best case: Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader at ≈ 1.2M–2.0M copies, ≈ $16.5M–$44.4M after Steam's cut.

What their first month looked like

About half the games that made it here had over 2k reviews in their first month; the range was 2k to 10k.

The genre you'd be entering

These games: The similar games share Sci-fi (4 of 8) and Story Rich (4 of 8).
The winners: Winners here lead with Character Customization + Cinematic, priced around $50.
When they shipped: The similar games span 2013 to 2024, and 1 of the 8 shipped in the last two years.

How these numbers were worked out

A hit here: 1,000+ reviews, roughly $150k+ before Steam's cut (a standard indie benchmark).

Copies come from each game's reviews times a sales-per-review rate that falls with release age, from about 31 for the most recent game here to about 79 for the oldest, then widened into a range; revenue rides on that estimate times price. Source: GameDiscoverCo (2020) and VG Insights (2021).

Similar games

Game	Est. copies	Est. revenue	Price	Reviews	Tags
Dome Keeper 2022	Est. copies ≈ 558k–906k 2.3x vs typical SteamSpy 2M–5M	Est. revenue $2.8M–$7.4M after Steam's cut $5.0M–$11.4M before Steam's cut	$17.99	22k reviews Very Positive	SingleplayerPost-apocalyptic
Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader 2023	Est. copies ≈ 1.2M–2.0M 5.1x vs typical SteamSpy 10M–20M	Est. revenue $16.5M–$44.4M after Steam's cut $30.0M–$68.3M before Steam's cut	$49.99	48k reviews Very Positive	Character CustomizationCinematic
OPUS: Echo of Starsong - Full Bloom Edition 2021	Est. copies ≈ 235k–382k SteamSpy 200k–500k	Est. revenue $1.6M–$4.3M after Steam's cut $2.9M–$6.7M before Steam's cut	$24.99	9k reviews Overwhelmingly Positive	Visual NovelEmotional
Exo One 2021	Est. copies ≈ 131k–213k SteamSpy 200k–500k	Est. revenue $612k–$1.6M after Steam's cut $1.1M–$2.5M before Steam's cut	$16.99	5k reviews Very Positive	AtmosphericExploration
Deliver Us The Moon 2019	Est. copies ≈ 276k–448k SteamSpy 200k–500k	Est. revenue $1.9M–$5.1M after Steam's cut $3.4M–$7.8M before Steam's cut	$24.99	10k reviews Very Positive	AdventureIndie
Mouthwashing 2024	Est. copies ≈ 0 too small to compare SteamSpy 500k–1M	Est. revenue $0 after Steam's cut $0 before Steam's cut	$12.99	0 reviews No user reviews	Psychological Horror Story Rich
The Invincible 2023	Est. copies ≈ 341k–554k SteamSpy 500k–1M	Est. revenue $2.8M–$7.6M after Steam's cut $5.1M–$11.6M before Steam's cut	$29.99	14k reviews Very Positive	AdventureRobots
The Swapper 2013	Est. copies ≈ 480k–780k SteamSpy 500k–1M	Est. revenue $2.0M–$5.3M after Steam's cut $3.6M–$8.2M before Steam's cut	$14.99	8k reviews Very Positive	PuzzleSci-fi