The idea that studios pocket 70% of what we pay is a myth — taxes aside. Steam’s refund system is slick and fast… and it also creates real headaches for developers.

We often oversimplify how devs earn money from game sales. Unless you’re first-party or have a special deal, you mentally subtract ~30% for stores/distribution, multiply by units sold, and call it a day. But beyond taxes — which vary by country — several variables complicate that neat equation. One of the biggest: refunds.

Steam led the way in June 2015 with its refund program; PlayStation, Xbox, and PC stores like Epic and GOG followed. The rules are familiar: under 2 hours of playtime and within 14 days of purchase. Because Steam processes requests, refunds are effectively automatic if you meet the criteria — it’s not the developer’s call.

Great for consumers, thorny for studios

Refunds aren’t perfect, as some cases have shown. The most obvious: sub–two-hour games — think the unmissable The Beginner’s Guide (2016) or the more recent Summer of ’58, after which Emika Games stepped away for a time.

These are edge cases that poke at Steam’s limits. That’s why Simon Carless’s broad developer survey in his GameDiscoverCo newsletter last February is so useful: nearly 150 responses across full releases and Early Access, from tiny projects to large ones.

This was the second run. The first aimed to move past the tired “70%” and toward a truer revenue picture. Focusing on No More Robots’ catalog, Simon estimated monthly refunds at 5%–8%, implying that of the total paid by players, studios netted roughly 58% (including average VAT effects).

This new sample shows title-level refund rates between 5% and 25%, with an average of 10.8% and a median of 9.5%. Given the diversity, he also split by project status — results broadly matched common sense.

Higher price, lower sentiment = more refunds

“Regular” releases average 10.3% refunds, Early Access games 12%, and EA titles that later fully released 11.4%. Cheaper titles (under $5) see ~8% refunds versus 11.9% for $30+ games. User sentiment tracks too: above 90% positive, refunds dip to just over 7%. By genre, sandbox/base-building sits around 14% — paradoxically among Steam’s most popular categories.

Refunds are undeniably a win for players — and it’d be fascinating to know how much refunded cash gets re-spent on a game we keep. But the takeaway is clear: a notable chunk of what we assume studios receive after purchase never actually reaches them.

Source: 3DJuegos