Origins Game Fair Confirms 19K Attendees in 2025

Origins Game Fair just took place in Columbus, Ohio, and GAMA has announced the attendance figures for this year's event.

Last year (2024), the convention attracted 17,706 unique attendees. This year (2025), that number is up 8% to 19,171 attendees.

This included 410 exhibitors, an increase by 26% over last year, and 8,810 scheduled events, up 27% on last year.

These figures confirm Origins as the 5th largest tabletop-specific convention in the world, following Essen Spiel, Gen Con, UKGE, and PAX Unplugged. In June, UK Games Expo attracted 42,000 attendees.

Convention​	Attendance​
Essen Spiel	204,000 (2024)*
Gen Con	71,000 (2024)
UK Games Expo	42,000 (2025)
PAX Unplugged	30,000 (approx)**
Origins Game Fair	19,171 (2025)

*It's not clear whether Essen reports uniques or turnstile figures.
**PAX does not provide figures, but estimates are available.

 

[Morrus]

Wow, I’m surprised that Origins is the 5th largest tabletop convention with those sort of attendee numbers. I thought there were more tabletop conventions pulling bigger numbers than that, but I’m likely thinking of a lot of “gaming” conventions that are more about tabletop miniatures games than RPGs.

Tabletop miniatures games are tabletop games.

A lot of the really big conventions which dwarf the likes of Gen Con are general pop culture or gaming conventions. Video games are much bigger than tabletop games. And pop culture generally is bigger than either. Pop Culture > Gaming > Tabletop Gaming > TTRPGs. We're right at the bottom niche of that list of decreasing niches.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

I’ve definitely experienced it at multiple conventions.

So have I, but not all of those cons were gaming cons. Any big, crowded con is going to reek sooner or later, even when the attendees are wearing three-piece suits and think $100 lunch is petty change. It's a stereotype that gamers are unusually stinky.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

The late E3 was huge when I went in early 00's

 

[dbolack]

I love that they list the uniques, but did they also mention the turnstile count?