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Market Guides8 min read

How to Launch Your Game in Poland: The 2026 Guide

By Jan Rojek

Warsaw Old Town square and the Palace of Culture and Science at night

Poland is one of Europe's most interesting games markets: over 15 million players, one of the strongest game-development industries in the world, and a payment system unlike anywhere else. It is also a market many publishers still treat as an afterthought — which is exactly why it can work well. This guide covers what a publisher needs to know before launching a game in Poland in 2026.

Key takeaways

  • Polish players spent €1.22 billion (PLN 5.16 billion) on games in 2025, according to Ipsos GameTrack for Video Games Poland (VGPL, 2026).
  • 15.9 million Poles aged 6–75 play games — half the population. 47% of players are women.
  • Smartphone games are the largest segment at €545 million, with 92% coming from in-app purchases.
  • Poland is a strong PC country: Polish is the 13th most-used language on Steam, far above the country's share of the world population.
  • BLIK is the payment method Poles use most online — 72% of online shoppers use it. A web shop without BLIK loses buyers.
  • The law requires Polish in offers and consumer information for customers in Poland.

How big is the Polish games market?

The 2025 GameTrack report for Video Games Poland puts consumer spending on games at €1.216 billion (PLN 5.161 billion) (VGPL, 2026):

Segment (2025)Spending
Smartphone and tablet games€545 m (45%)
Console games€272 m
PC games€239 m
Subscriptions€157 m

Spending per player is lower than in Western Europe — paying players spend on average around €41 a year on smartphone games, €51 on console and €35 on PC. Advertising is usually cheaper than in Germany or the US too, which is what makes Poland attractive. The real question is always the balance between the two, and it is only answered by testing.

Who plays games in Poland?

  • 15.9 million players — 50% of people aged 6–75, close to the European average of 51%.
  • 74% of players are adults, and more than half are aged 25–54.
  • 47% of players are women; on smartphones the split is exactly 50/50. PC (62% men) and console (67% men) lean male.
  • Poles play 8 hours 38 minutes a week on average.

All figures: GameTrack 2025 (VGPL).

Is Poland a PC gaming market?

Partly. By reach, smartphones lead (13.3 million players), followed by PC (6.9 million) and console (5.3 million). But 43% of Polish gamers play on PC, and Poland stands out on Steam: Polish is 1.69% of all Steam users, the 13th most-used language on the platform (Steam Hardware & Software Survey, August 2026) — roughly three to four times Poland's share of the world's population. Steam (47%), the Epic Games Store (29%) and the EA app (19%) are the most-used PC stores.

For a publisher, that makes Poland one of the best European markets for PC strategy, shooters and online games — alongside a large smartphone audience.

Which genres and games lead in Poland?

On smartphones, puzzle (29%), casual (22%), card (22%) and strategy games (15%) are the most played. On PC, adventure (39%), shooters (33%), strategy (23%) and RPGs (22%) lead. Coin Master was the top-grossing smartphone game of 2025 (VGPL, 2026).

Strategy games stand out in the Google Play top-grossing chart: Whiteout Survival, Total Battle and Last War all ranked in the top ten in early 2025, alongside Coin Master, Roblox, Brawl Stars and Royal Match (42matters).

How do Polish players pay?

BLIK is Poland's own mobile payment system, built into Polish banking apps. It had 20.7 million active accounts at the end of 2025 and handled 1.4 billion online purchases that year (BLIK, 2026). Among online shoppers, 72% use BLIK — 90% of those aged 15–24 — ahead of bank transfer links (64%, through PayU, Przelewy24 or Tpay) and cards (43%) (Gemius, 2025). Since May 2024, BLIK also works on Google Play for one-off purchases.

For a web shop or any payment outside the app stores, BLIK and pay-by-link transfers are essential in Poland.

Polish players are price-aware. The #PolishOurPrices campaign has pushed for lower Steam prices in złoty, and the consumer authority UOKiK opened an inquiry into Steam pricing in 2025. Prices set in złoty that feel fair locally — not converted from euros — matter.

What rules apply when launching a game in Poland?

Polish language

The Polish Language Act requires Polish in offers and consumer information for consumers in Poland; where another language version exists, the Polish one governs (Polish Language Act, Art. 7). Store pages, terms, prices and in-game shop text should be in Polish.

PEGI and loot boxes

Poland uses PEGI ratings. Since June 2026, new PEGI submissions with paid random items (loot boxes) get at least PEGI 16, and battle passes or time-limited offers at least PEGI 12 (PEGI, 2026). Games already rated are not re-rated.

Consumer protection

UOKiK is an active regulator in games. In 2024 it opened an investigation into the PlayStation Store, Steam and two Polish publishers, with possible fines of up to 10% of turnover (UOKiK, 2024). EU consumer authorities, including UOKiK, set out principles in 2025 for in-game currencies: prices must be clear in real money.

Data protection

Poland's data protection authority UODO issued PLN 64.5 million in fines in 2025, up from PLN 13.9 million a year earlier (CRN, 2026). Landing pages need a GDPR-compliant consent banner, as everywhere in the EU.

What do Polish players expect from localisation?

Polish players are proud of their games industry — The Witcher has sold 85 million copies and Cyberpunk 2077 35 million (CD Projekt, 2026) — and they know what a good Polish version sounds like. Not every international game ships with one, which is an advantage for publishers who make the effort: a full Polish version, Polish ads and a Polish landing page stand out immediately.

Which marketing channels work in Poland?

Polish gamers find out about games mainly through YouTube and video (25%), websites (25%) and social media (20%). Facebook (26%) and YouTube (23%) are the leading platforms, ahead of Instagram, TikTok and Discord (VGPL, 2026). A Polish launch typically combines:

  • Meta, Google and YouTube — YouTube alone reaches 27 million people in Poland, Facebook almost 19 million (DataReportal, 2026).
  • TikTok, which reaches about 40% of Polish adults.
  • The big Polish portals — Wirtualna Polska, Onet (Ringier Axel Springer) and Interia each reach around 19–20 million users a month (Mediapanel, May 2026) and offer display and native advertising.
  • Creators on YouTube and Twitch, with YouTube Gaming the leading streaming platform in Poland.
  • Events: Digital Dragons in Kraków (May), Pixel Heaven in Warsaw (June) and Poznań Game Arena (23–25 October 2026).

How Nomads Digital approaches a Polish launch

Poland is one of Nomads Digital's core markets, alongside Germany, France, South Korea and the US. Our campaigns for Rise of Kingdoms and State of Survival ran across Europe for more than a year each.

For a Polish launch we:

  1. Research the market first — which strategy and casual games buy Polish traffic, and which angles they use.
  2. Build Polish creatives and funnels written to sound Polish, not translated. Every interactive funnel ships in 20+ languages, with each visitor seeing their own automatically.
  3. Test on live traffic — Poland's lower traffic prices make it a good market for testing angles, and budget moves daily to what works.
  4. Measure to the paying player, from click to registration, install, retention and payer. In a market with lower spend per player, only the full picture shows whether Poland pays back.

Read more about how we run game user acquisition.

Launch checklist for Poland

  1. Localise the game, store pages, terms, shop and support into Polish.
  2. Set prices in złoty that feel fair locally.
  3. Offer BLIK and pay-by-link transfers wherever players pay outside the app stores.
  4. Review loot boxes and limited-time offers against the new PEGI rules.
  5. Show virtual currency prices clearly in real money.
  6. Use a GDPR-compliant consent banner on every landing page.
  7. Plan for both audiences: smartphone players and a strong PC audience.
  8. Include the big Polish portals alongside Meta, Google, YouTube and TikTok.
  9. Label all creator content as advertising.
  10. Track every campaign from click to paying player, and judge Poland on its own numbers.

Frequently asked questions

How big is the Polish games market?

Polish consumers spent €1.22 billion (PLN 5.16 billion) on games in 2025, according to GameTrack. Smartphone games were the largest segment at €545 million.

How many people play games in Poland?

15.9 million people aged 6–75 — half of the population. 47% of them are women.

What is BLIK, and do games need it?

BLIK is Poland's mobile payment system, used by 72% of Polish online shoppers. Any game selling outside the app stores in Poland should offer it.

Is Poland a good market for PC games?

Yes. 43% of Polish gamers play on PC, and Polish is the 13th most-used language on Steam — well above Poland's share of the world's population.

Do games have to be translated into Polish?

Polish law requires offers and consumer information for Polish consumers to be in Polish. A full Polish version also clearly improves how a game is received.

More market guides

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