Tabletop games are the engine of crowdfunding: 80% of the 6,646 tabletop projects launched on Kickstarter in 2024 reached their goal, the highest success rate in the platform’s 15-year history, and they took 83% of all Games pledges (Kickstarter, 2024 Was a Big Year for Games on Kickstarter, February 2025). Successful tabletop campaigns collected $220M that year, out of $270M pledged to Games overall. The ceiling keeps rising: the Official Cyberpunk Trading Card Game passed $28 million in 2026, which Kickstarter calls the most funded tabletop game in crowdfunding history, while Gamefound, a games-first rival, has accumulated more than EUR 921 million in pledges. Broader context on the hobby is in our board game statistics. We aggregated data from Kickstarter, Gamefound, BackerKit, Hasbro and Asmodee financial filings, the US Federal Trade Commission, and peer-reviewed studies in the Journal of Business Venturing, Design Science and Technological Forecasting and Social Change.
TL;DR
- 80% of tabletop games launched on Kickstarter in 2024 were funded (5,314 of 6,646), a 15-year high (Kickstarter, February 2025).
- $220M was pledged to successful tabletop campaigns in 2024; Games overall drew $270M (Kickstarter, February 2025).
- Tabletop took 83% of 2024 Games pledges on Kickstarter (Kickstarter, February 2025).
- Kickstarter Games has raised $2.63B across 93,756 projects since 2009 (Kickstarter, February 2025).
- The Official Cyberpunk TCG raised more than $28 million, the most funded tabletop game in crowdfunding history (Kickstarter, May 2026).
- Gamefound lists EUR 921,620,810 in pledges from 1,981,983 backers across 3,715 projects (Gamefound, About page, October 2026).
- BackerKit reports a 99.79% fulfillment success rate across 3,300 projects shipped through its pledge manager (BackerKit, 2025 in Crowdfunding).
- Hasbro’s tabletop gaming revenue rose 62% to $1,686.6 million in 2025 (Hasbro Q4 2025 earnings release).
- Asmodee’s board game sales grew 16.0% in April-June 2026 (Asmodee Q1 FY2026/27 interim report).
- 75% of Kickstarter projects in a 48,500-project dataset delivered later than expected (Mollick, Journal of Business Venturing).
- Crowdfunded board games are significantly more likely to use novel mechanism combinations (Wachs and Vedres, Technological Forecasting and Social Change 2021).
- The FTC’s first crowdfunding case involved a board game that raised more than $122,000 from 1,246 backers (FTC, 2015).
1. Kickstarter Tabletop Pledges and Success Rates
The headline number is not the dollar total, it is the hit rate. 5,314 of 6,646 tabletop projects launched on Kickstarter in 2024 were funded, an 80% success rate (Kickstarter, 2024 Was a Big Year for Games on Kickstarter). An all-or-nothing platform where four in five tabletop campaigns succeed is no longer a lottery for unknown designers; it is a pre-order channel used by publishers who already know their audience.
The money is concentrated in tabletop. Of the $270M pledged to Games projects in 2024, tabletop took 83%, and successful video game campaigns collected $26M, a 28% increase over 2023. Kickstarter also says 78% of Games projects raising $100,000 or more across all crowdfunding platforms launched on Kickstarter, a platform-reported figure that frames the competitive picture covered in section 3.
| Metric | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Tabletop games projects launched, 2024 | 6,646 | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Tabletop projects successfully funded, 2024 | 5,314 (80% success rate, highest in 15 years) | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Pledged to successful tabletop campaigns, 2024 | $220M | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Pledged to all Games projects, 2024 | $270M | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Tabletop share of 2024 Games pledges | 83% | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Pledged to successful video game campaigns, 2024 | $26M (up 28% vs 2023; 441 successful campaigns, up 9%) | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Games projects and pledges since 2009 | 93,756 projects, $2.63B | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Games backers who also back other categories | 70% | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
Context note: Kickstarter’s public stats page now redirects to its 2025 Year in Review, which describes 2025 as “Kickstarter’s biggest year to date” but publishes no Games or tabletop totals for 2025 (Kickstarter, A Year in Review 2025). Most recent available category data: Kickstarter, 2024. Kickstarter’s 2026 creator guide puts its platform fee at 5% of successful projects plus payment processing of roughly 3-5%, with no fees if a goal is missed.
2. Record Campaigns: From Cosmere to Cyberpunk
The record book was rewritten twice in two years. The Official Cyberpunk Trading Card Game raised more than $28 million, which Kickstarter describes as the most funded tabletop game in crowdfunding history (Kickstarter, Video Games Are Leveling Up on Kickstarter, May 2026). It launched March 17, 2026 with a $100,000 goal that doubled within minutes, and had already passed $15M when Kickstarter declared it the biggest TCG in crowdfunding history on March 31 (Kickstarter, March 2026).
The prior Games record was a tabletop RPG. Brandon Sanderson’s Cosmere RPG had raised $14,556,997 from 52,648 backers when Kickstarter named it the most-funded Games campaign in August 2024 (Kickstarter, Creator Spotlight, 2024), and Kickstarter later cited $15.1M+ from 55,106 backers. RPGs keep producing eight-figure results: Neon Odyssey raised more than $16 million from 49,000+ backers. Our D&D and TTRPG statistics cover that segment in more depth.
| Metric | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Official Cyberpunk TCG, total raised | More than $28 million | Kickstarter, May 2026 |
| Cyberpunk TCG goal / milestone at two weeks | $100,000 / over $15M by March 31, 2026 | Kickstarter, March 2026 |
| Cyberpunk TCG pre-launch followers | Over 48,000 | Kickstarter Case Study, March 2026 |
| Cosmere RPG at record announcement | $14,556,997 from 52,648 backers | Kickstarter, August 2024 |
| Cosmere RPG later total | $15.1M+ from 55,106 backers | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Neon Odyssey (ENNIE winner) | More than $16 million, 49,000+ backers | Kickstarter, August 2026 |
| The Crooked Moon (ENNIE winner) | Over $4 million, more than 21,000 backers | Kickstarter, August 2026 |
| Most funded crowdfunding campaign overall (EufyMake E1, a printer) | $46,762,258 from 17,822 backers | Kickstarter, June 2025 |
Context note: the Neon Odyssey and Crooked Moon figures come from Kickstarter’s ENNIE Awards roundup, August 2026. The EufyMake record (Kickstarter, June 2025) is included for scale only; it is a hardware project, not a game. Kickstarter did not publish a final backer count for Cyberpunk TCG in the pages we read, and the project page could not be loaded.
3. Platform Competition: Gamefound, BackerKit and Kickstarter
Tabletop is the one crowdfunding category where specialist platforms have real scale. Gamefound’s About page listed EUR 921,620,810 in total pledges from 1,981,983 backers across 3,715 projects and 1,327 creators when read in October 2026 (Gamefound, About us). The platform dates its first fully-fledged crowdfunding campaign, ISS Vanguard, to December 17, 2020, so most of that volume has accumulated in under six years.
BackerKit competes from the fulfillment side. It reports 1.4M+ packages shipped and 3,300 projects fulfilled through Pledge Manager Pro, with a 99.79% fulfillment success rate, plus 3x year-over-year growth in Collab-Funding campaigns and 7x growth in Collab-Funding pledge volume (BackerKit, 2025 in Crowdfunding). Kickstarter answered with its own pledge manager (launched May 2025) and exclusivity deals: Mantic Games, with nearly 30 Kickstarter projects behind it, committed to Kickstarter exclusively through 2026 (Kickstarter, May 2025).
| Metric | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Gamefound total pledges | EUR 921,620,810 | Gamefound, About page, October 2026 |
| Gamefound backers / projects / creators | 1,981,983 / 3,715 / 1,327 | Gamefound, About page, October 2026 |
| BackerKit packages shipped / projects fulfilled (Pledge Manager Pro) | 1.4M+ / 3,300 | BackerKit, 2025 in Crowdfunding |
| BackerKit fulfillment success rate | 99.79% | BackerKit, 2025 in Crowdfunding |
| BackerKit RPG project growth over three years | 12x (3 of the top 10 crowdfunded TTRPGs of 2025) | BackerKit, 2025 in Crowdfunding |
| BackerKit pre-launch reservations converting to pledges | 80% | BackerKit, 2025 in Crowdfunding |
| Kickstarter backers, all categories | More than 26 million people | Kickstarter, How Crowdfunding Works, 2026 |
| Mantic Games Kickstarter exclusivity | Through end of 2026 (nearly 30 projects) | Kickstarter, May 2025 |
Context note: all platform figures are self-reported and not audited; BackerKit’s 99.79% rate and Gamefound’s live counters are company claims, not independent measurements. Gamefound reports in euros and Kickstarter in dollars, so the totals should not be compared without a currency conversion and a common date range.
4. The Publishers Behind the Pledges: Hasbro, Asmodee and the Tariff Shock
Crowdfunding sits inside a tabletop market that is growing fast at the top. Hasbro’s tabletop gaming revenue reached $1,686.6 million in 2025, up 62%, and Magic: The Gathering finished “its strongest year ever” at $1,720.1 million, up 59% (Hasbro Q4 2025 earnings release, SEC Form 8-K). Momentum carried into 2026: tabletop gaming revenue rose 30% to $528.3 million in Q2 2026, and Magic passed $500 million in a single quarter for the first time (Hasbro Q2 2026 earnings release).
Asmodee, which describes itself as a global leader in tabletop gaming, reported net sales of EUR 422.1 million in April-June 2026, up 20.9% (20.2% organic), with board games up 16.0% and trading card games up 23.1% (Asmodee, Q1 FY2026/27 interim report). Big publishers also run campaigns: Asmodee’s Zombicide drew over 11,000 people pledging more than EUR 3 million in its first crowdfunding campaign as part of Asmodee. Tariffs were the cost shock of the period, with Hasbro booking a $1,021.9 million goodwill impairment in its Consumer Products segment triggered by tariffs, and BackerKit naming rising manufacturing and shipping costs as a defining 2025 challenge for creators.
| Metric | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Hasbro tabletop gaming revenue, FY2025 | $1,686.6 million (+62%) | Hasbro Q4 2025 earnings release |
| Magic: The Gathering revenue, FY2025 | $1,720.1 million (+59%) | Hasbro Q4 2025 earnings release |
| Wizards of the Coast and Digital Gaming revenue, FY2025 | $2,186.9 million (+45%), 46.0% operating margin | Hasbro Q4 2025 earnings release |
| Hasbro tabletop gaming revenue, Q2 2026 | $528.3 million (+30%) | Hasbro Q2 2026 earnings release |
| Hasbro goodwill impairment triggered by tariffs | $1,021.9 million (Consumer Products) | Hasbro Q4 2025 earnings release |
| Asmodee net sales, April-June 2026 | EUR 422.1 million (+20.9%, +20.2% organic) | Asmodee Q1 FY2026/27 interim report |
| Asmodee growth by category, April-June 2026 | Board games +16.0%, TCGs +23.1% | Asmodee Q1 FY2026/27 interim report |
| Asmodee net sales, FY2025/26 | EUR 1.7 billion (adjusted EBITDA margin 17.0%) | Asmodee investor relations, 2026 |
Context note: Hasbro’s tabletop line is dominated by Magic and is not a proxy for independent board game publishers. Asmodee says it expects to benefit from tariff refunds related to previously paid duties but gives no amount. The overlap between collectible card games and crowdfunding is covered in our trading card statistics.
5. Delivery Risk: Late Rewards, Failed Projects and Enforcement
A pledge is a promise, not a purchase, and the research on delivery is sobering. In Ethan Mollick’s study of more than 48,500 Kickstarter projects with combined funding over $237M, 75% of projects delivered products later than expected, even though the vast majority of founders did fulfill their obligations (Mollick, The dynamics of crowdfunding, Journal of Business Venturing). Most recent available large-sample study: Mollick, published 2013.
Smaller studies of physical products find even lower on-time rates. A review of 144 successfully funded Kickstarter hardware campaigns found no more than 32% delivered on time, and late projects were significantly more likely to ship products missing expected attributes (Jensen and Ozkil, Design Science 2018). Enforcement exists but is rare: the FTC’s first crowdfunding case targeted the creator of the board game The Doom That Came to Atlantic City, who raised more than $122,000 from 1,246 backers against a $35,000 goal, cancelled after 14 months and spent the money on personal expenses (FTC, June 11, 2015).
| Metric | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Projects delivering later than expected | 75% (48,500+ projects, $237M+ funding) | Mollick, Journal of Business Venturing (2013) |
| Funded hardware campaigns delivering on time | No more than 32% (144 campaigns) | Jensen and Ozkil, Design Science 2018 |
| Backers who did not receive rewards on time | 35% | Tran et al., IEEE/ACM ASONAM 2017 |
| Projects fulfilled on time or under six months late / delivering nothing | About 30% / 40% (35 projects) | van Otterloo, Computers and Society Research Journal 2022 |
| FTC case: raised vs goal | More than $122,000 vs $35,000 goal (1,246 backers) | FTC, 2015 |
| FTC suspended judgment | $111,793.71 | FTC, 2015 |
| BackerKit-reported fulfillment success | 99.79% | BackerKit, 2025 in Crowdfunding |
Context note: the van Otterloo study (Computers and Society Research Journal 2022) covers only 35 projects and should not be generalized; the Tran et al. figure is from a 2017 paper (IEEE/ACM ASONAM 2017). None of these studies isolates tabletop games, so they describe reward crowdfunding broadly. The contrast with BackerKit’s 99.79% reflects different definitions: the platform measures shipments processed through its own tool, while academic studies measure whether backers got what was promised on time.
6. Why Publishers Crowdfund: Innovation, Community and Backer Returns
The case for crowdfunding board games goes beyond capital. Board games funded by the crowd are significantly more likely to implement novel combinations of mechanisms than traditionally published games, and later games imitate those features (Wachs and Vedres, Technological Forecasting and Social Change 2021). In other words, Kickstarter works as the hobby’s research lab, with the innovations spilling over into retail releases.
The community layer is measurable too. A study of European game campaigns on Kickstarter in 2017 found that offering tangible rewards such as tabletop games, playing cards and video games raised success chances by up to 18 percent (Galkiewicz and Jantapan, ITEMA 2021). Research by Doug Noonan of Indiana University Indianapolis, published by Kickstarter, estimates that successful projects created 1,005,100 jobs between 2009 and 2025, based on a survey of 1,565 creators (Kickstarter, May 2026). Fan-funded models in tabletop resemble those in our Patreon creator retention statistics: recurring community support matters as much as any single campaign.
| Metric | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Crowdfunded vs traditionally published board games | Significantly more likely to use novel mechanism combinations | Wachs and Vedres, Technological Forecasting and Social Change 2021 |
| Effect of tangible game rewards on success (European games, 2017) | Up to 18 percent higher success chances | Galkiewicz and Jantapan, ITEMA 2021 |
| Average unconditional annualized return to Kickstarter backers | 11.5% (about 30% for successful projects) | Dobrynskaya and Grebennikova, Economic Analysis Letters 2023 |
| Jobs created by successful Kickstarter projects, 2009-2025 | 1,005,100 | Kickstarter / Noonan (Indiana University Indianapolis), May 2026 |
| Creator survey sample for jobs study | 1,565 successful creators | Kickstarter / Noonan, May 2026 |
| Kickstarter Open Call success rate, 2025 | Close to 80% | Kickstarter, A Year in Review 2025 |
| SideQuest tabletop event, 2026 | Two-week campaigns, July 14 to August 1; organizer reports $100+ average pledge | Kickstarter, July 2026 |
Context note: the backer-return estimate (Dobrynskaya and Grebennikova, 2023) values rewards as financial returns and covers Kickstarter broadly, not games alone. The jobs figure is from research published by Kickstarter on its own blog. The SideQuest model of small, affordable, shipping-included campaigns with no pledge managers is described in Kickstarter’s July 2026 profile, and is a deliberate reaction to the delivery risks in section 5.
Summary: Kickstarter Board Game Crowdfunding by the Numbers
| Metric | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Tabletop success rate on Kickstarter, 2024 | 80% (5,314 of 6,646) | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Pledged to successful tabletop campaigns, 2024 | $220M | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Pledged to all Games projects, 2024 | $270M | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Tabletop share of Games pledges, 2024 | 83% | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Games pledges since 2009 | $2.63B across 93,756 projects | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Games projects raising $100K+ that launched on Kickstarter | 78% | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Most funded tabletop game in crowdfunding history | Official Cyberpunk TCG, more than $28 million | Kickstarter, May 2026 |
| Previous Kickstarter Games record | Cosmere RPG, $15.1M+ from 55,106 backers | Kickstarter, February 2025 |
| Neon Odyssey TTRPG | More than $16 million, 49,000+ backers | Kickstarter, August 2026 |
| Gamefound total pledges | EUR 921,620,810 | Gamefound, October 2026 |
| Gamefound backers | 1,981,983 | Gamefound, October 2026 |
| BackerKit fulfillment success rate | 99.79% | BackerKit, 2025 in Crowdfunding |
| Hasbro tabletop gaming revenue, FY2025 | $1,686.6 million (+62%) | Hasbro Q4 2025 earnings release |
| Hasbro tabletop gaming revenue, Q2 2026 | $528.3 million (+30%) | Hasbro Q2 2026 earnings release |
| Asmodee board game growth, April-June 2026 | +16.0% | Asmodee Q1 FY2026/27 interim report |
| Projects delivering later than expected | 75% | Mollick, Journal of Business Venturing (2013) |
| Funded hardware campaigns delivering on time | No more than 32% | Jensen and Ozkil, Design Science 2018 |
| FTC first crowdfunding case (board game) | More than $122,000 from 1,246 backers | FTC, 2015 |
Methodology and Sources
Every figure above was read during research for this article on a platform’s own published page, a company filing or earnings release, a regulator’s press release or a peer-reviewed abstract. Platform figures are self-reported, and we label them as such.
- Kickstarter: 2024 Was a Big Year for Games on Kickstarter (February 2025), A Year in Review 2025, Cyberpunk TCG record (March 2026), Video Games Are Leveling Up (May 2026), Cosmere RPG spotlight (August 2024), ENNIE Awards roundup (August 2026), EufyMake record (June 2025), Mantic Games exclusivity (May 2025), SideQuest (July 2026), jobs impact study (May 2026), How Crowdfunding Works (2026)
- Gamefound: About us page (live counters, read October 2026)
- BackerKit: 2025 in Crowdfunding: BackerKit’s Biggest Moments (January 15, 2026)
- Hasbro (SEC Form 8-K exhibits): Q4 and full-year 2025 earnings release, Q2 2026 earnings release
- Asmodee Group: Q1 FY2026/27 interim report (August 4, 2026), investor relations
- US Federal Trade Commission: Crowdfunding project creator settles FTC charges of deception (June 11, 2015)
- Peer-reviewed and academic research: Mollick, The dynamics of crowdfunding, Journal of Business Venturing, Jensen and Ozkil, Design Science 2018, Tran et al., IEEE/ACM ASONAM 2017, van Otterloo, Computers and Society Research Journal 2022, Wachs and Vedres, Technological Forecasting and Social Change 2021, Galkiewicz and Jantapan, ITEMA 2021, Dobrynskaya and Grebennikova, Economic Analysis Letters 2023
- Data watch: Kickstarter’s public stats page (help/stats) now redirects to its 2025 Year in Review, which gives no Games or tabletop totals for 2025, so the latest category-level Kickstarter data is for 2024. Kickstarter gave two figures for the Cosmere RPG ($14,556,997 from 52,648 backers in August 2024, and $15.1M+ from 55,106 backers in February 2025); the later figure likely includes post-campaign pledges, but Kickstarter does not say. Cyberpunk TCG’s total is stated only as “more than $28 million” (May 2026) and the project page returned an error. Gamefound’s figures are live counters from its About page, read through a text mirror, and will have moved by the time you read this. BackerKit’s metrics are company claims. Mollick’s 75% late-delivery finding (published 2013) is the most recent available study at that scale and predates the modern pledge-manager era; no delivery study we found isolates tabletop games. ICv2 hobby-market estimates, Circana toy and game sales data and the BackerKit blog index could not be loaded (404 or 403 errors), so no third-party estimate of the total hobby games market is included. Searches were run through primary-source pages directly because a general web search was not available.
Last updated: October 3, 2026. We update this roundup quarterly, and the next refresh is expected when Kickstarter publishes its 2026 Year in Review and Games recap, and Hasbro and Asmodee report results for the quarter ending September 2026.