Twitch will stop operating in South Korea next year due to high network costs

Twitch will stop operating in South Korea next year. According to CEO Dan Clancy, this happens because of the high costs the company has in that country. The service will end on February 27, 2024 local time, the company said.

Clancy mentions the costs of Twitch in South Korea ‘excessively high’, despite experiments the company has conducted to reduce those costs there. For example, the company tried peer-to-peer streams and limited the source quality to 720p in South Korea. “While these efforts have reduced costs, our network costs are down [Zuid-Korea] still ten times higher than in most other countries,” claims the CEO.

The Twitch CEO says he sees no possibilities to run the service in a ‘more sustainable’ way in the country. He emphasizes that the situation in South Korea is ‘unique’. According to Clancy, the company has been open for some time about the challenges surrounding providing services in the country. Twitch will therefore remain available in other countries. Twitch will work with South Korean streamers to move their communities to other livestreaming services, Clancy said. The company will contact those alternative services to smooth the transition.