What percentage of indie developers use Unity for desktop games?

About 50.2 percent of the 920 surveyed developers selected Unity as their development platform. This made it the most common choice, ahead of Godot at 33.6 percent and Unreal Engine at 10.4 percent. The data comes from self reported submissions to a free market insights calculator.

What is the average team size for Godot game projects?

The surveyed Godot developers reported an average team size of 2 people. Around 70.5 percent worked solo, which is higher than the solo rates for Unity and Unreal Engine. This indicates Godot projects in the sample lean toward individual creators.

What are the top game genres for Unity developers?

Action leads with 30.0 percent of Unity submissions, followed by Simulation at 12.8 percent and Strategy at 12.2 percent. Unreal Engine also favors Action at 28.4 percent, with Strategy and Adventure close behind. The genre split was collected from each developer's selected main genre in the calculator.

What median price do indie devs expect per game unit?

Unity and Godot developers both reported a median expected revenue of about $10 per unit. Unreal Engine developers expected a slightly higher median of $12 per unit. Most respondents across all three engines clustered in the $6 to $10 price bucket.

Why does GameMaker have low representation in the survey?

Only 1.1 percent of the 920 submissions came from GameMaker Studio users despite its long indie history. The sample focuses on desktop developers, and many likely migrated to Unity or Godot. Custom engines actually had a slightly higher share at 2.0 percent.

What 920 indie developers actually expect from their games

I have been working with the Unity platform around 12 years now. I have met many developers working with many engines like Unity, Unreal Engine, GameMaker, and later newer engines like Godot. All of them created lovely games, but they all have one thing in common: they did not enjoy getting out there and marketing their games. But they all want to make money. And that is where the marketing comes in. Many did not know how to get started with marketing their games. What competition is out there? What are the best practices? And so on. So to give a first head start, I created a small free market insights calculator for game developers. I researched a lot of statistics, and based on that, I created a calculator that gives developers a better insight into where they stand with their game and their expectations. It also includes info on wishlists, revenue, etc., showing how important marketing is. I made it public in August 2025, and now one year later, in 2026, I wanted to share the results. At that point the calculator only supported the desktop platform, but now it also supports the mobile platform. So the following stats are based on 920 developers who filled out the calculator for the desktop platform. So in the following sections I share results I found interesting.

Development Platform Distribution

You can select a variety of development platforms in the calculator. But the three biggest, by far, as submitted by the developers, are Unity, Unreal Engine, and Godot.

Unity: 50.2%
Godot: 33.6%
Unreal Engine: 10.4%

As you can see, Unity is the clear winner here. But it is not really surprising that Godot is in second place here too, because Godot is currently the top platform by developer usage. Still very interesting for me, because my website focuses on the Unity platform, but 34% still entered Godot.

Platform	Submissions	%
Unity	460	50.2
Godot	308	33.6
Unreal Engine	95	10.4
Other	22	2.4
Custom	18	2.0
GameMaker Studio	10	1.1
Construct	1	0.1
Flutter	1	0.1
React Native	1	0.1
Android Studio	1	0.1

Table 1: The development platform distribution Some interesting observations:

Unity and Godot together make up almost 84% of all submissions. After that, the drop-off is steep: Unreal sits at 10%, and everything else is noise.
Custom engines (2.0%) outnumber GameMaker (1.1%). For a tool with such a long indie history, GameMaker is almost absent here.
Tools built for mobile (Flutter, React Native, Android Studio) barely appear, which makes sense: this dataset is desktop only.

Platform vs. Genre Breakdown

A game also has a main genre, next to keywords like tags. First place is the Action genre across the big three platforms:

Unity: 30.0%
Godot: 18.8%
Unreal Engine: 28.4%

Here is a detailed breakdown of how each development platform's submissions split across genres. Each row adds up to 100% of that platform's entries. This can help you see which genres are the most popular on each platform.

Platform	Action	Strategy	Casual	Adventure	Simulation	Other	Role Playing	Racing	Sports
Unity	30.0	12.2	10.9	11.5	12.8	11.3	7.4	2.6	1.3
Godot	18.8	17.2	14.9	11.7	9.4	12.7	12.7	1.9	0.6
Unreal Engine	28.4	16.8	11.6	14.7	14.7	4.2	6.3	3.2	0.0
GameMaker Studio	40.0	30.0	10.0	0.0	0.0	10.0	10.0	0.0	0.0
Custom	16.7	27.8	11.1	0.0	0.0	11.1	22.2	5.6	5.6
Other	4.5	9.1	13.6	31.8	13.6	4.5	22.7	0.0	0.0
Android Studio	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Flutter	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Construct	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
React Native	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0

Table 2: Genre share of each development platform's submissions (%) Some interesting observations:

Action is the default on Unity (30.0%) and Unreal (28.4%), but Godot is much more even: Action is only 18.8%, with Strategy close behind at 17.2%.
Role Playing is much more common on Godot (12.7%) than on Unity (7.4%).
Sports is basically dead across the board: 1.3% Unity, 0.6% Godot, 0% Unreal.

Platform vs. Revenue Expectations

You want to make money with your game. And that is why you are here. So let's see what the developers expect in terms of revenue. The median revenue expectation per unit:

Unity: $10.00
Godot: $9.99
Unreal Engine: $12.00

As you can see, Unity and Godot developers have similar expectations of a listing price of $10 per unit, median-wise. Unreal is at $12, which is 20% higher. Here is how each development platform's submissions split across expected revenue per unit buckets. Each row adds up to 100% of that platform's entries.

Platform	Free	$0-5	$6-10	$11-15	$16-20	$21-25	$26-30	$36-40	$46-50	$56-60	$96-100
Unity	13.0	12.2	34.3	17.4	13.0	4.1	4.8	0.4	0.2	0.2	0.2
Godot	11.4	24.0	28.9	18.2	12.7	2.3	1.9	0.3	0.3	0.0	0.0
Unreal Engine	9.5	8.4	30.5	22.1	15.8	7.4	5.3	0.0	0.0	0.0	1.1
GameMaker Studio	20.0	20.0	10.0	30.0	20.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Custom	27.8	11.1	22.2	27.8	5.6	5.6	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Other	22.7	40.9	13.6	18.2	4.5	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Android Studio	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Flutter	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Construct	0.0	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
React Native	0.0	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0

Table 3: Expected revenue per unit share of each development platform's submissions (%) Some brief observations:

$6-10 is the most common bucket for all three big engines, which matches the ~$10 median.
Godot is the cheap-game engine: 24.0% sit in $0-5, vs 12.2% Unity and 8.4% Unreal.
Almost nobody prices above $30. The $36+ tail is 1.0% of Unity, 0.6% of Godot, and 1.1% of Unreal (one $96-100 outlier).

The share of free desktop games is around 10% for all of them, which makes sense. In the desktop market, a large share of revenue comes from the unit price. For mobile it is mostly ads-based, so free is the way to go (but that is not included in these charts) — just my guess.

Platform vs. Team Size

Developing a game is a team effort. So let's see how many people are working on a game on each platform. The average team size for the big three platforms:

Unity: 4
Godot: 2
Unreal Engine: 4

As you can see, Unity and Unreal Engine developers have similar average team sizes, around 4 people. Godot is at 2, half the size. Here is how each development platform's submissions split across team size buckets. Each row adds up to 100% of that platform's entries.

Platform	Personal (1)	Small (2-5)	Medium (5-25)	Large (25-100)	Major (100+)
Unity	55.9	35.9	7.2	0.7	0.4
Godot	70.5	27.9	1.6	0.0	0.0
Unreal Engine	46.3	46.3	6.3	1.1	0.0
Other	63.6	36.4	0.0	0.0	0.0
Custom	88.9	5.6	0.0	0.0	5.6
GameMaker Studio	80.0	10.0	10.0	0.0	0.0
Construct	0.0	0.0	100.0	0.0	0.0
Flutter	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
React Native	0.0	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Android Studio	100.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0

Table 4: Team size share of each development platform's submissions (%) Some interesting observations:

Godot is a solo engine in this sample: 70.5% personal vs 55.9% Unity and 46.3% Unreal. That is why the average team size is 2.
Unreal is the most team-shaped of the three: personal and small (2-5) are tied at 46.3% each.
Large studios barely show up here: 1.1% of Unity, 1.1% of Unreal, and 0% of Godot.

What do you think? Did you expect such numbers? If you are interested, please feel free to check out the calculator here: https://www.guardingpearsoftware.com/calculator/market

What 920 indie developers actually expect from their games

Development Platform Distribution

Platform vs. Genre Breakdown

Platform vs. Revenue Expectations

Platform vs. Team Size

Frequently asked questions

Stay in the Loop.

What 920 indie developers actually expect from their games

Development Platform Distribution

Platform vs. Genre Breakdown

Platform vs. Revenue Expectations

Platform vs. Team Size

Frequently asked questions

What percentage of indie developers use Unity for desktop games?

What is the average team size for Godot game projects?

What are the top game genres for Unity developers?

What median price do indie devs expect per game unit?

Why does GameMaker have low representation in the survey?

More on this topic

Stay in the Loop.