A race in World of Warcraft outshines all others. No other is as popular – and it is miles ahead of the least popular race overall.
In World of Warcraft, there is not only a variety of classes with varying popularity, but also a large amount of different races that you can choose from when creating a character. However, not all of them are equally popular. But which race is the most popular? And which one hardly anyone wants to play? Statistics provide a good insight.
Where do the data come from? The data come from the website Data for Azeroth. This analyzes several hundred thousand WoW accounts and examines the achievements, characters, and various other information. From this, interesting statistics can be created, which allow you to see, for example, what percentage of WoW fans have a certain achievement or which race is played particularly often. We took a look at this last value.
For this evaluation, we only looked at characters at the maximum level (i.e., level 80). This filters out smaller characters and especially “bank twinks”.
Elves dominate, even ahead of Humans
The first glance at the statistics makes it clear that elves in World of Warcraft are the most popular races.
Blood elves lead with a whopping 15.5 % of all characters, making them the most popular race – slightly ahead of night elves, who account for 14.7 %.
Blizzard’s plan, back during The Burning Crusade, has worked out perfectly. The blood elves were added to the Horde mainly to provide a “pretty” race in the Horde. 18 years later, one must say that the plan has worked almost too well, as about one in eight characters in the game is a Sin’dorei.
Humans, traditionally very popular in fantasy games, make up “only” 10.6 % in WoW and are already significantly behind the two elf races.
The Orcs, the poster child of the classic Horde, account for only 6.7 % of the characters.
Void elves – the most popular allied race
It is not surprising that Void elves enjoy a great popularity with 4.1 %. They are clearly ahead of all other “allied races”. They are essentially a substitute for Alliance fans who have always wished for playable high elves. Even though the dream has not been entirely fulfilled, Void elves can essentially look like high elves – and that is exactly why they are so popular.
Mechagnomes are old – and the least popular race
On the other side of the statistics, particularly the allied races that have come into the game over the years can be found. Nightborne, Lightforged Draenei, and Highmountain Tauren have only under 2 % each.
Pandaren still stand at 2.4 % (Alliance and Horde combined) and are thus still relatively “common”.
Anyone thinking that the latest allied race, the Earthen, is the rarest is mistaken. Because Alliance and Horde Earthen combined account for 1.1 %. Thus, they are still represented twice as often as the Mechagnomes, which only account for a measly 0.6 %.
Mechagnomes were controversial even at their introduction. In the eyes of many, they simply look silly, and the fact that their special mechanical body parts often overwrite any transmogification and prominently showcase their mechanical hips has earned them the unfortunate nickname “Diaper Gnomes”.
On which side of the statistics do you belong? Do you play the most popular races? Or are you an oddball who identifies more with Mechagnomes or Kul Tirans?
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