Modders made $350 million with Minecraft's official mod marketplace

    Since the Mojang-approved platform went live in 2017, modders selling their wares via the game's official mod marketplace have earned a total of $350 million.

    In its quarterly investor call yesterday, Microsoft mentioned Minecraft as an example of how the company is developing tools and opportunities to help build out the economic side of the metaverse model, which more and more games are embracing.

    "We're developing new tools to help everyone sell creations on our platforms as games grow into metaverse economies," Microsoft CEO Sataya Nadella said. "More than one billion downloads of mods, add-ons, and other Minecraft experiences have netted creators more than $350 million. This does not include behaviour that takes place outside of our own marketplace."

    In terms of players and the demand for those in-game wares, Nadella also stated that Minecraft now has nearly 130 million monthly active players, up 30% from 2020. This is an increase from 126 million MAUs in May 2020 and 91 million in May 2019.

    On a wider scale, Minecraft was specifically called out in Microsoft's Q3 2021 financials as the driving force behind unexpectedly strong performance of first-party titles. There's no mention of specific numbers in that regard, but the nod indicates Minecraft did its part to help see Microsoft's More Personal Computing segment to $13 billion in Q3 revenue.