In significant industry news, Twitch, the widely-used streaming platform, has announced termination of its services in South Korea effective February 27, 2024. The decision was made public by Twitch CEO Dan Clancy, who cited exorbitant operational costs in the region as the key reason for this pullout. Clancy detailed the company's efforts to reduce costs, including a shift to a peer-to-peer model and capping streaming quality at 720p. Despite these measures, the network fees in Korea remained substantially higher than in other countries, leading to unsustainable losses for Twitch in the Korean market. Consequently, Korean streamers will no longer have access to Twitch's monetization features from the shutdown date, and final payouts are scheduled for March 16. Twitch Affiliates and Partners in Korea will face off-boarding from the platform by June 4 following the cessation of Twitch's operations in the area.

Why is Twitch shutting down in South Korea?

Twitch is shutting down its services in South Korea due to the prohibitively high cost of operations in the country. Despite efforts to reduce expenses, the streaming platform has faced continuous significant losses, with network fees being ten times more expensive compared to other countries.