Gaming & Virtual Worlds · Projected milestone

Virtual economies the size of nations

Estimated year~2048

42% by 2053 · including earlier years

The year is an editorial timing estimate. The percentage applies to occurrence by the stated deadline. These estimates are not calibrated odds.

Spending and wages inside virtual worlds add up to more than the GDP of a G20 country.

What the forecast means

Milestone stage: milestone (legacy definition)

Completion criteria: Legacy milestone: refine the observable threshold before resolving.

This page describes a forecast, rather than an achieved result. Read the methodology and assumptions.

No individual source links are recorded for this milestone. Source coverage and review status vary across the atlas.

Dataset updated 2026-10-18. This individual record has not been separately re-reviewed.