Roblox is No. 7 on Fast Company’s list of the World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies of 2023. Explore the full list of companies that are reshaping industries and culture.
At Roblox, the metaverse isn’t just a futuristic vision dependent on mind-blowing technology that’s yet to emerge from the lab. The company has built an immersive 3D universe that’s here right now—and attracts nearly 60 million daily active users on PCs, Macs, Xbox consoles, tablets, and phones. In 2022, those fans got to attend virtual performances by Lizzo, Mariah Carey, Elton John, and the Chainsmokers, and were courted by brands such as Burberry, Gucci, H&M, and Walmart, all of which chose Roblox for their maiden metaverse voyages.
These notable names signal a new era for the platform, which originated as an educational game for grade-schoolers. More than half of users are now over 13, and the company recently rolled out new “experience guidelines”—akin to movie ratings—designed to help both kids and older folks find appropriate content. While brands might be flocking to Roblox for the publicity value, creators are already profiting in the most literal sense. They publish 15,000 games and other experiences a day on the platform, hundreds of which were visited 100 million times or more in 2022. Roblox’s revenue hit $2.2 billion last year, up 16% from 2021. Over the past 12 months, the company has paid creators more than $600 million from the sales of digital goods, such as the outfits and accessories users buy to dress up their avatars.
Thanks to this economic opportunity, Roblox’s developer base has already expanded “from hobbyists to people who make a living on the platform, to people who build studios, to people who build studios with a hundred people or more, to people who raise venture financing to build a studio,” says cofounder and CEO David Baszucki. Roblox’s new Creator Hub—a one-stop destination for tools, documentation, and advice—aims to help all these constituencies construct even more ambitious and engaging virtual playgrounds for the platform’s community. And they can do it today.
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