February proved an incredibly successful month for miHoYo as Honkai: Star Rail revenue soared, almost doubling month-on-month from $47.5 million to $90.5 million generated on mobile alone.

This pushed Honkai: Star Rail ahead of Genshin Impact once again - their race continuing - as miHoYo’s older title brought in only $89.8 million in February. This was actually a sharp decline from the $99 million generated in January, but still landed Genshin Impact with the silver medal among gacha games for the month.

These earnings, collated on GachaRevenue with Sensor Tower data, show the significant rise in Honkai: Star Rail spending came predominantly from China.

When combining iOS data with estimated Android data in the territory, Chinese gamers spent $60.5 million in-game in February compared to $27.5 million in January, more than doubling their contribution and demonstrating that not only is Honkai: Star Rail sustaining its success, but it still has potential to grow even further.

Spending surge

In January, Honkai: Star Rail generated $20 million in in-game revenue excluding China which, while an impressive figure, did mean a slip to fifth place amongst the biggest gacha games that month, and signalled an $8 million drop from December.

Genshin Impact, meanwhile, generated $7 million more in January than December, bringing in $36 million (excluding China) as 2024 got underway and broadened its lead over Honkai: Star Rail at the time.

Clearly February has turned that back around as each title continues battling to be the best - and continuing to fill miHoYo’s pockets in the process. Genshin Impact’s revenue fell from $63 million to $57.8 million month-on-month in China and from $36 million to $32 million across the rest of the world, whereas Honkai: Star Rail’s rose from $27.5 million to $60.5 million in China and from $20 million to $30 million everywhere else.

This means that Genshin Impact actually remained more successful outside of China, but Star Rail’s steep rise in its home territory pushed it marginally ahead in the end. Their worldwide earnings came out exceedingly close at $89.8 million and $90.5 million respectively, netting miHoYo a comfortable $180.3 million across these two games alone.

Honkai: Star Rail’s Version 2.0 update released in early February with in-game events to celebrate and encourage further spending. Additions to the gacha Misha, Black Swan, and Sparkle were likely causes of a surge in spending, all released over the month alongside the return of Jing Yuan and Imbibitor Lunae.

While Honkai: Star Rail has the lead again for now, whether it has what it takes to claim Genshin’s crown as the fastest game ever to reach $5 billion in consumer spending, that remains to be seen…