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Considering launching a Kickstarter campaign?
You need to check out these Kickstarter stats first.
Kickstarter is considered the OG of crowdfunding platforms launching in 2009. It is still one of the most used and visited crowdfunding platforms in the world today.
It makes sense right…
It’s a win-win! But the truth is just because you launch on Kickstarter doesn’t mean you are guaranteed success.
There are lots of factors that determine the success of a campaign and different types of products have better success rates than others.
These useful Kickstarter stats will show you what it takes to be successful on Kickstarter and what you need to think about before launching your own campaign.
Let’s dive in.
What Will I Learn?
Kickstarter certainly has a big resume when it comes to crowdfunding.
These are some of the biggest Kickstarter stats you need to know:
These Kickstarter stats paint a picture of a successful platform with a history of connecting backers with the right projects.
It has made Kickstarter one of the most trusted crowdfunding platforms in the world.
There are certainly a lot of backers on Kickstarter looking for projects to back.
But what about the Kickstarter projects themselves?
Here are some project-based Kickstarter stats to pay attention to:
One of the big standouts in this group of Kickstarter project stats is the successful dollars vs unsuccessful dollars.
The truth is that Kickstarter seems to be a great place to test the concept of your project.
Most times Kickstarter projects that get completely funded go on to be successful.
If you have a great idea, Kickstarter can help you verify your idea, find your consumers and turn it into a successful business.
It’s no secret that some categories on Kickstarter get more pledges than others.
These are the top 3 categories:
| Ranking | Category | Lifetime Pledges (USD) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Games | $2.37 billion |
| 2 | Design | $1.66 billion |
| 3 | Technology | $1.48 billion |
What really makes these Kickstarter stats important is the fact that a huge 92% of all 1 million Kickstarter projects were in the games, design and technology categories.
If you have a product in any of those categories, you have a much higher chance of running a successful project on Kickstarter.
Games have always been a popular category on Kickstarter.
The COVID-19 pandemic only increased its popularity as people were spending more time inside their homes.
In 2020 alone table-top board games raised $234 million in pledges.
This was a 30% increase on 2019 – where board games raised $176 million.
This is the full breakdown since 2015:
| Year | Pledged (USD) |
|---|---|
| 2015 | $84.6 Million |
| 2016 | $101.2 Million |
| 2017 | $137.77 Million |
| 2018 | $165 Million |
| 2019 | $176.3 Million |
| 2020 | $233.8 Million |
Since the beginning of Kickstarter, total pledges in board games have amounted to $1.72 billion. Board games have continued to make a comeback recently, particularly amongst millennials.
Design is a huge category with lots of different products.
Collectively since the beginning of Kickstarter design projects have raised $1.66 billion in pledges. This makes it the second most popular Kickstarter category.
Part of the reason that design is a successful category is that it has so many products and projects that fit into it.
Technology covers projects that are new and innovative in the tech space.
They are primarily physical projects.
To date, technology Kickstarter projects have a total of $1.48 billion in pledges. This makes it the third biggest category in terms of pledges raised.
The most popular technology projects tend to be innovative products that solve specific problems. Products that are too complicated don’t work well on Kickstarter.
But just because they are specific doesn’t mean they are cheap. Technology products have proved that even high ticket items over $500 can be very successful.
It’s all about conveying value.
Just because certain Kickstarter categories get more pledges, doesn’t mean they have high success rates to get fully funded.
Crowdfunding success is usually found in the art categories. These are the top 3:
| Ranking | Category | Success Rate (%) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Comics | 62.27% |
| 2 | Dance | 61.54% |
| 3 | Theatre | 59.95% |
Comics are widely popular on Kickstarter.
Why?
Because they don’t cost a lot to produce and often attract large numbers of backers.
The total success rate of comics is 62.27%. This makes it the most successful category in terms of successfully reaching its goal in pledges for each project.
The digital versions of comics typically go for about $10 to $20. Physical print versions of comics are usually about $25 to $45.
The most successful comic producers on Kickstarter leverage the platform to create a loyal fan base of readers. That means they will create a series of comics and launch each comic as a separate project.
Dance Kickstarter projects are primarily dedicated to real dance performances.
They can be anything from social projects to for-profit projects. While not the most popular category on Kickstarter, projects do have a high success rate.
61.54% of all dance Kickstarter projects reach their target goal.
This means that dance is the second-highest category in terms of success rate.
The reason that most dance projects reach their goal is that their targets are much smaller than other projects on Kickstarter.
Dance campaigns on Kickstarter have brought in a total of $16.28 million in pledges. This is in contrast to a category like technology with a lifetime of $1.48 billion in pledges.
Theatre is similar to dance in the way that most projects are for real-life productions.
It also has a very similar success rate of 59.95%. This makes theatre the third most successful category on Kickstarter in terms of success rate.
What do you get for pledging to theatre projects?
It can include anything from your name in the end credits to a digital ticket. It depends on how much you pledge and the specific theatre Kickstarter project you back.
Most successfully funded projects raise less than $10,000. Having a lower target on your Kickstarter project means that you increase the chance of getting fully funded.
It’s important to note that lots of projects set lower targets of around $10,000 and end up far exceeding this number.
Kickstarter limits projects by time rather than pledge amounts. That means you usually have 30-60 days (you choose) to raise as many pledges as possible – even if you achieve your goal early.
There is also a growing number of campaigns that have six, seven and in very rare cases, eight-figures. It comes down to the quality of your product and knowing what your audience wants.
To date, there have been 253,079 successfully funded projects.
Here’s the breakdown of how much those successfully funded projects raised in pledges:
| Successful Projects | Amount Raised (USD) |
|---|---|
| 32,585 Projects | Raised less than $1,000 |
| 133,791 Projects | Raised between $1,000 to $9,999 |
| 36,637 Projects | Raised between $10,000 to $19,999 |
| 38,582 Projects | Raised between $20,000 to $99,999 |
| 10,685 Projects | Raised between $100k to $999,999 |
| 799 Projects | Raised $1+ million or more |
Statistically, this means 66.4% of successful projects had a target of less than $10,000. On the other hand, just 4.2% of successful projects raise over $100k.
Keep this in mind when you are creating your own project.
Smaller targets generally attract more backers than projects that have huge targets.
3 categories have more projects that have been successfully funded than all the other categories.
Here is the breakdown of them:
| Ranking | Category | Total Successful Projects |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Games | 40,713 |
| 2 | Music | 34,936 |
| 3 | Video & Film | 32,640 |
Why care about the total number of successful projects in each category?
Simple – A pool of backers is potentially limited in each category.
The categories that have the most successful projects in total probably have more backers. If you run a campaign in those categories you increase your chances of success.
As we have seen, games are a good category for Kickstarter campaigns.
It has the highest number of lifetime pledges and comes in 1st place for successfully funded projects with 40,713 projects.
Games is by far one of the most popular categories on Kickstarter with high success rates and a ton of successful campaigns. Not to mention the number of pledges the category has attracted.
Here’s the truth: Music is competitive.
Up-and-coming artists look to Kickstarter to try and fund new albums.
The competition is fierce.
But since 2009 there have been 34,936 fully funded music projects. This makes it the number #2 category on Kickstarter for successfully funded projects.
The average successful Kickstarter project in the music category asks for a pledge of $4 for a single song. For an album, the average is about $13. Most projects have goals of less than $8,000.
Popular music campaigns also tend to include higher pledge bundles that include merchandise and posters. Music is another category on Kickstarter that artists use to build a loyal following as well as raise money.
Film and video is an interesting category.
They have the thrid-highest number of successfully funded projects at 32,640. But film and video also have the second-highest failure rate.
Why?
There are tons of film and video projects. In fact, film and video come in 4th place for total funds raised attracting $570.48 million in pledges since 2009.
These Kickstarter stats tell us that the film and video niche is competitive but does have a lot of backers willing to pledge to projects.
Now you have a good idea of what categories tend to be the most successful on Kickstarter and which categories attract the most pledges.
But what about specific projects?
These are the top 15 most successful projects on Kickstarter as of February 2024, in terms of pledges:
| Project | Backers | Pledges (USD) |
|---|---|---|
| Surprise! Four Secret Novels by Brandon Sanderson | 185,341 | $41.75 Million |
| Pebble Time Smartwatch | 78,471 | $20.34 Million |
| Coolest Cooler | 62,642 | $13.29 Million |
| Frost Haven | 83,193 | $12.97 Million |
| Pebble 2, Time 2 Smartwatch | 66,673 | $12.78 Million |
| Kingdom Death: Monster 1.5 | 19,264 | $12.39 Million |
| EcoFlow DELTA Pro: The Portable Home Battery | 3,199 | $12.18 Million |
| Travel Tripod by Peak Design | 27,168 | $12.14 Million |
| Critical Role: The Legend of Vox Machina Animated Special | 88,887 | $11.39 Million |
| Pebble: E-Paper Watch | 68,929 | $10.27 Million |
| Avatar Legends: The Roleplaying Game | 81,567 | $9.54 Million |
| The World’s Best Travel Jacket | 44,949 | $9.91 Million |
| Marvel Zombies – A Zombicide Game | 28,974 | $9.03 Million |
| The Wyrmwood Modular Gaming Table | 7,713 | $8.81 Million |
| Exploding Kittens | 219,382 | $8.78 Million |
What’s interesting about this list is the fact that Pebble, which creates smartwatches, launched 3 successful campaigns with different products.
All of those campaigns feature in the top 10 most successful projects ever.
In total Pebble raised over $43.39 million in pledges and had 214,073 Kickstarter backers across all 3 projects!
The truth is that Kickstarter can help you create a loyal fan base that is willing to back up different projects with different products.
Pebble eventually ended up being sold to Fitbit in December 2016. It was estimated to have sold between $34 million and $40 million.
The other thing these Kickstarter stats show is that it’s not all about price.
Both high-ticket and low-ticket products can work on Kickstarter. The key to being successful is creating great and innovative products that your audience will love.
Not every project that launches on Kickstarter is successful.
10% of all projects never receive a single pledge and 60.89% of all projects fail. There have been 361,513 projects in total that were unsuccessful.
What does unsuccessful mean?
It means that the project doesn’t reach the goal that was set at the beginning.
Here’s a breakdown of the amount projects get funded:
| Number Of Projects | Percentage Funded (%) |
|---|---|
| 56,330 | 0% Funded |
| 236,850 | 1% to 20% Funded |
| 37,656 | 21% to 40% Funded |
| 16,834 | 41% to 60% Funded |
| 7,350 | 61% to 80% Funded |
| 6,491 | 81% to 99% Funded |
That means that only about 4 out of 10 projects on Kickstarter will be successful.
The good news is that the unsuccess rate of projects is decreasing each year.
This is primarily due to the fact that Kickstarter has built a lot of trust with customers as a brand and has a very good idea of how to run successful projects.
In the future, they hope to bring the Kickstarter projects fail rate below 50%.
The truth is that some projects are more likely to be unsuccessful based on the category they are in.
This can be because there are fewer Kickstarter backers overall or because the category is more competitive.
These are the top 3 categories that have the most unsuccessfully funded projects:
| Ranking | Category | Unsuccessfully Funded Projects |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Film & Video | 52,755 |
| 2 | Games | 42,548 |
| 3 | Technology | 41,029 |
Film and video have the most unsuccessfully funded projects with 52,755 projects not funded to date.
This is despite the fact that it has the second most funded projects to date.
How is that possible?
There are just more Kickstarter campaigns in the film and video category. It simply means that there is a lot of competition.
Despite getting the third most pledges in terms of real dollars, Games is the second most unsuccessfully funded category with 42,548 projects not funded. Technology takes third place with 41,029.
Whenever you launch a Kickstarter campaign ensure that you check up on your competitors to get a better idea of what projects are out there.
Now you have a good idea of what categories tend to be the most and least successful on Kickstarter.
Ready to launch your own Kickstarter campaign?
These Kickstarter stats detail what the most successful campaigns have in common.
The best time to launch a Kickstarter is on Tuesday between 8 AM and 1 PM EST. This is when the Kickstarter site receives a lot of visitors.
May and August tend to be the best months although it doesn’t seem to matter too much. December is the worst month to launch your campaign.
The top 15 campaigns ever on Kickstarter had an average of 13.7 rewards.
Think of rewards like packages that you put together based on how much money people pledge. The more they pledge, the more they get.
Just make sure that all of your offered tangible rewards are interesting for your target audience.
One of your rewards should be something for a pledge of $1. This is a great way to collect lots of email addresses and increase your backers.
The most successful Kickstarter campaigns run for an average of 39 days.
If you know anything about Kickstarter you will know that the project video is one of the most important parts of the campaign.
Think of the video as your number #1 salesperson.
The average video for the top 15 campaigns was 3 minutes and 11 seconds. The average video on Kickstarter goes 2 minutes and 10 seconds.
Most experts recommend having a video that is between 1 to 3 minutes long for your campaign.
What’s more?
Only 20% to 30% of people will watch your entire video. That means you need to have the important things up front so as many people as possible will see them.
Knowing who the main audience is on Kickstarter is important so you can craft the right campaign. 64% of all Kickstarter backers are male. That means only ⅓ of Kickstarter backers are female.
| Gender | Percentage Of Users (%) |
|---|---|
| Male | 64% |
| Female | 36% |
88% of all Kickstarter users are college-educated.
How old are they?
The biggest amount of pledges come from the 25 to 34-year-old age range.
The second biggest group is the 35 to 40-year-olds.
This is the full breakdown by age:
| Age Group | Percentage Of Users (%) |
|---|---|
| 18-24 | 11% |
| 25-34 | 37% |
| 35-44 | 28% |
| 45-54 | 10% |
| 55-64 | 9% |
| 65+ | 5% |
That means that 65% of Kickstarter users are between the ages of 25 and 44.
What do all of these Kickstarter stats mean?
Your campaign will be primarily advertised to-
Keep that in mind when creating your campaign and writing your project copy.
The challenge to creating a great Kickstarter campaign is knowing what’s going to get your audience’s attention.
Use these Kickstarter stats to get a better understanding of what successful campaigns look like. This will help you craft a project that appeals to your target audience and generate the results you want.
Remember:
The number of successfully funded Kickstarter campaigns is increasing every year.
There is no doubt that Kickstarter is a great platform to be on and provides you with everything you need to create a viral campaign.
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