How strong is SCS Software really? The deepest market analysis of ETS 2, ATS, and the trucking empire!

If you look soberly at the structure of the company, then SCS Software today is significantly larger and more layered than many people still have in mind from the old perception of it as a “small Czech studio.” The Prague-based company was founded in 1997, has been developing for decades on its in-house Prism3D engine, and on its official press page lists more than 20 released titles, including Bus Driver, the 18 Wheels of Steel series, Scania Truck Driving Simulator, American Truck Simulator, and of course the Euro Truck Simulator series. Strategically, however, something else is even more important: SCS is no longer just “the ETS2 company,” but operates an entire road traffic ecosystem with ETS2, ATS, World of Trucks, the Driving Academy, the SCS Blender Tools, as well as new projects such as Project Road Trip and Project Coaches. And this ecosystem still belongs to an independent studio, not to a large corporation. On Steam, SCS appears for both ETS2 and ATS as both developer and publisher. This independence is remarkable in today’s market because the studio does not have to realign its model every year according to corporate logic, but has been able to continue developing it over the years from its own product structure.

The picture becomes even more impressive when looking at the personnel and economic dimension. In an official HR blog, SCS in March 2025 already named 370 employees for January 2025 and unusually openly broke down the internal structure: about 120 map designers for ETS2 and ATS, around 60 graphic designers, approximately 30 colleagues in vehicle design, more than 30 in QA, testing, and support, in addition to about two dozen programmers and just under that number in game design. This is no longer a small sim forge, but a production machine working in parallel on map creation, vehicles, content, technical maintenance, and future modules.

External economic sources from the Czech Republic fit this picture strikingly well: Forbes Czech lists SCS in 2026 as one of the most profitable family businesses in the country and, based on preliminary 2025 results, speaks of more than 1.2 billion CZK in revenue and around 1 billion CZK EBITDA. Seznam Zprávy placed the studio for 2024 at around 1.3 billion CZK in revenue and nearly 600 million CZK in profit. Forbes Czech also cited for 2025, as a CEO statement, that SCS had sold over four million games, more than ten million expansions, and generated 1.3 billion CZK in revenue with almost 600 million CZK in profit. Even if these statements must properly be treated as secondary sources and not as freely viewable official annual reports, they clearly point in the same direction: SCS is economically long since no longer a small niche studio.

If you roughly convert 1.3 billion CZK based on today’s exchange rates, you end up at around 50 to 52 million euros in annual revenue as a journalistically relevant order of magnitude. And formulated even more sharply: SCS thus appears less like a classic game developer and more like a highly efficient content company with a strong reuse effect.

The economic core of this model, however, remains Euro Truck Simulator 2. Already on its 10th anniversary, SCS officially stated that ETS2 had sold over 13 million copies in its first ten years, while Steam showed over 80 million purchased DLCs for the game. By now, the official press page even mentions over 22 million sold copies of ETS2. This is enormously important in brand-strategic terms because it shows how strongly the platform continues to be monetized years after its original launch phase.

The current market strength on Steam is even more exciting: SteamDB listed ETS2 on April 6, 2026 at 918,570 reviews, of which 97.3 percent were positive, with an all-time peak of 73,887 concurrent players on February 22, 2026. That exact moment is actually the explosive part. The peak did not come in the early life phase from 2012 to 2016, but more than 13 years after release. This fundamentally distinguishes ETS2 from many long-running simulation games that may run for years, but never reach their peak again.

ETS2 therefore appears less like “an old game that is still being dragged along,” and more like a permanent platform that can generate new waves of users again and again. In addition, there is the long-tail model: even older map DLCs continue to sell. At the beginning of 2025, SCS explicitly described the Scandinavia expansion as one of its most popular and oldest add-ons and cited over 5 million sold copies. That is the real economic strength of the studio: not a one-time launch hype, but a long-term business that grows over years and scales strongly.

American Truck Simulator is smaller than ETS2, but long since no secondary lane anymore. The official press page speaks of over 7 million sold copies, while SteamDB currently shows 185,562 reviews, 96.8 percent positive ratings, around 8,404 concurrent active players at the time of retrieval, and a historic peak of 19,153 concurrent players. External ownership models estimate ownership at roughly 3.88 to 9.59 million accounts, which is model-based and not official, but underlines the scale.

Economically, this means: SCS is not sitting on one strong brand, but on two complementary trucking brands – one extremely compatible with Europe, one clearly profiled toward America. This division significantly reduces risk compared to a single-brand model.

Added to this is the DLC logic. On SteamDB, the ATS DLC structure is now visible as enormous; the page lists over 70 DLC entries, while ETS2 likewise looks at a massively grown add-on catalog with packages, bundles, cargo, trailer, paint, and map DLCs. And here lies perhaps the greatest strategic difference compared with many other simulation studios: SCS does not sell a new full-price main game with a new number every year, but keeps ETS2 and ATS alive as permanent platforms. New revenue comes through maps, cargo, paint jobs, vehicle expansions, bundles, and new module ideas within the same platforms. While other studios have to collect users again with every new main version, SCS continues to extract value from a user base of buyers, collectors, and returnees built up over years.

There is something else that makes SCS economically almost even more stable than the DLC figures alone: the community infrastructure. Already in 2021, SCS named on its own channels reach figures of 1 million Facebook followers for ETS2, over 235,000 on the ATS Facebook page, nearly 220,000 on the verified SCS Facebook page, 120,000 on the Steam Developer Hub, 300,000 YouTube subscribers, and almost 180,000 Instagram followers.

Today, the press page even names 451,000 YouTube subscribers, over 1 million ETS2 Facebook followers, 1.7 million monthly views on the company blog, and above all 5.2 million registered users on World of Trucks. This is where the model becomes investigatively interesting: World of Trucks is not just a nice community gimmick, but a retention instrument. Since its launch on October 16, 2013, the platform has kept players in the brand space, connects events, screenshots, profiles, customization, and seasonal campaigns, and creates SCS’s own infrastructure beyond Steam.

A good current example is the Cruising Louisiana Event: at the beginning of February 2026, SCS reported that the community had exceeded the set mark of 125 million miles before the deadline and ultimately reached 132,663,569 miles. That is not an irrelevant side activity, but direct proof of enormous mobilization capability. In addition, SCS actively invests in modding: the SCS Blender Tools are officially provided free of charge, including wiki, forum support, and freely available source code. Strategically, this is smart because part of long-term retention is fueled not only by official DLCs, but also by the modding scene.

Of course, despite this strength there are also points of friction, and these should not be softened in a clean analysis. One frequent point of criticism remains the feeling around prices, especially with ATS state DLCs. In the official forum in 2023, it was openly criticized that several states are priced at 11.99 US dollars, although scope and number of cities vary strongly and individual DLCs can feel more isolated in gameplay terms without adjacent owned DLCs.

Added to this is the technical basis. Because SCS has relied on Prism3D for decades, debates regularly arise in the community about DX12, multithreading, rendering, and the speed of technical modernization. These discussions do not show that the community is working against the studio, but that expectations are now at a much higher level than before.

An important historical reminder fits here well: SCS already had to react to fundamental criticism in 2016 and fundamentally rebuild ATS with the famous rescale from 1:35 to 1:20. That was not a small patch, but a free long-term project with massive impact. Exactly such course corrections have helped shape why SCS, despite criticism, is often perceived as a studio that actually continues developing its products.

The same can be seen today in product maintenance: in 2025, SCS announced the Scandinavia Refresh, explicitly with the aim of bringing the old add-on closer to modern quality standards and making the transition to Nordic Horizons feel cleaner. In parallel, major core updates continued in 2026; ETS2 version 1.58 was released in February 2026, while content such as Nordic Horizons, Greece, Louisiana, and previously Iowa continued to be actively marketed. This shows how high the production cadence has now become: technical maintenance, map creation, and content releases are running simultaneously.

That is exactly why the new directions of growth are so interesting. In 2025 and 2026, it became very clear that SCS is cautiously expanding its core business beyond the classic truck framework. With Project Road Trip, the studio is developing a concept for ATS that is supposed to use the highway space from another vehicle perspective. With Project Coaches, an officially new driving experience around long-distance coaches is emerging in ETS2 in parallel. In addition, with British Columbia, ATS is taking its first major step beyond the U.S. border into Canada.

This is strategically clever because SCS is not giving up its enormous truck sim base, but is expanding the existing ecosystem with new usage layers. Existing maps, technology, teams, community, and brand awareness are being reused further instead of being put at risk through a complete break.

Especially with all the current figures, the next big question arises almost automatically: How far can SCS Software still grow at all? Honestly, from the outside the company currently appears almost gigantic. With Euro Truck Simulator 2, American Truck Simulator, World of Trucks, the ongoing map DLCs, technical reworks, and new projects such as Coaches and Road Trip, at first glance it almost looks like growth that can hardly be slowed down anymore. But this is exactly where it becomes journalistically exciting, because in economic terms there is practically never such a thing as infinite growth.

SCS’s greatest strength is currently at the same time one of the most important points for the future: the platform model. While other studios have to regularly sell new main games, SCS has kept its core products alive for years as permanent platforms. ETS2 and ATS are no longer simply games, but rather a constantly growing traffic ecosystem. This exact model appears extremely robust at the moment because existing players keep returning, buying new DLCs, and staying tied in the long term through events and mods. That is exactly why I also see SCS continuing to be very strongly positioned in the coming years.

Nevertheless, there are also real risks that should not be ignored. The probably biggest point is the technical basis. The in-house Prism3D engine has carried the studio for decades and enabled the growth in the first place. At the same time, however, the pressure to keep up technically grows with every further year. Topics such as modern lighting, performance, multithreading, weather effects, and generally up-to-date graphical quality are becoming increasingly important for the community. This is exactly where it will be decided in the long term whether SCS merely manages its lead or can continue to expand it. If the technology keeps pace with content growth, the model remains extremely strong. If not, this could at some point become the greatest brake.

A second point is the increasing size of the DLC ecosystem. For long-time players, this is a great advantage because the game world keeps growing. For new players, however, this exact size can also be intimidating. Anyone entering today is looking at an enormous number of map DLCs, cargo packs, vehicle expansions, and bundles. The danger here lies less in declining interest, and more in a rising barrier to entry. That is exactly why more important bundle models, better starter packages, and a clearer structure for new players could become decisive in the future.

From my perspective, however, the most exciting thing is SCS’s strategic future beyond the classic truck segment. Projects such as Coaches and Road Trip already show very clearly that the studio is cautiously expanding its existing ecosystem. And this is exactly where the next great growth may lie. If SCS succeeds in making the existing road and map universe usable not only for trucks, but also for long-distance buses, travel traffic, and further road vehicles, then the company will grow not only in content terms, but also toward new target groups. This could become the next major stage of development.

My personal, journalistic look at the future is therefore very clear: a classic crash currently appears rather unlikely. The real dangers lie less in a lack of success and more in technology, price perception, and barriers to entry. If SCS solves these points properly, then the company currently does not look like a studio at its peak, but more like a company that is preparing the next great growth phase.

Especially with all the current figures, the next big question arises almost automatically: How far can SCS Software still grow at all? Honestly, from the outside the company currently appears almost gigantic. With Euro Truck Simulator 2, American Truck Simulator, World of Trucks, the ongoing map DLCs, technical reworks, and new projects such as Coaches and Road Trip, at first glance it almost looks like growth that can hardly be slowed down anymore. But this is exactly where it becomes journalistically exciting, because in economic terms there is practically never such a thing as infinite growth.

SCS’s greatest strength is currently at the same time one of the most important points for the future: the platform model. While other studios have to regularly sell new main games, SCS has kept its core products alive for years as permanent platforms. ETS2 and ATS are no longer simply games, but rather a constantly growing traffic ecosystem. This exact model appears extremely robust at the moment because existing players keep returning, buying new DLCs, and staying tied in the long term through events and mods. That is exactly why I also see SCS continuing to be very strongly positioned in the coming years.

Nevertheless, there are also real risks that should not be ignored. The probably biggest point is the technical basis. The in-house Prism3D engine has carried the studio for decades and enabled the growth in the first place. At the same time, however, the pressure to keep up technically grows with every further year. Topics such as modern lighting, performance, multithreading, weather effects, and generally up-to-date graphical quality are becoming increasingly important for the community. This is exactly where it will be decided in the long term whether SCS merely manages its lead or can continue to expand it. If the technology keeps pace with content growth, the model remains extremely strong. If not, this could at some point become the greatest brake.

A second point is the increasing size of the DLC ecosystem. For long-time players, this is a great advantage because the game world keeps growing. For new players, however, this exact size can also be intimidating. Anyone entering today is looking at an enormous number of map DLCs, cargo packs, vehicle expansions, and bundles. The danger here lies less in declining interest, and more in a rising barrier to entry. That is exactly why more important bundle models, better starter packages, and a clearer structure for new players could become decisive in the future.

From my perspective, however, the most exciting thing is SCS’s strategic future beyond the classic truck segment. Projects such as Coaches and Road Trip already show very clearly that the studio is cautiously expanding its existing ecosystem. And this is exactly where the next great growth may lie. If SCS succeeds in making the existing road and map universe usable not only for trucks, but also for long-distance buses, travel traffic, and further road vehicles, then the company will grow not only in content terms, but also toward new target groups. This could become the next major stage of development.

My personal, journalistic look at the future is therefore very clear: a classic crash currently appears rather unlikely. The real dangers lie less in a lack of success and more in technology, price perception, and barriers to entry. If SCS solves these points properly, then the company currently does not look like a studio at its peak, but more like a company that is preparing the next great growth phase.

My conclusion is therefore very clear: as of April 2026, SCS Software is one of the economically strongest and strategically most stable simulation studios in Europe. The studio is large enough to work on several major construction sites in parallel, but independent enough not to reinvent its model every year according to investor fashion.

If Dovetail is the heavyweight in the rail segment, then SCS in the truck segment is probably currently the most stable, most mature, and most deeply rooted platform player in the entire simulation industry. Constructively, I continue to see SCS in the future very strongly as a platform studio rather than a yearly release machine, broader in the field of road traffic simulation through Coaches and Road Trip, but with one clear mandatory task: technical modernization.

The longer ETS2 and ATS continue to run, the more important engine progress, performance, and rendering become. And the larger the libraries grow, the more sensitive price acceptance will also become – in the long term, more visible care for existing customers, bundles, and upgrade logic could therefore become even more important. But as of today, the sober classification remains: SCS does not primarily earn through ever-new numbers on the box, but through the long-term exploitation of an already established user base. And that is exactly what makes the studio economically so strong.

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Is SCS Software currently the market leader in the truck sim segment for you? Do you play more ETS2 or ATS? Do you find SCS’s platform model stronger than yearly restarts? How fair do you currently feel the DLC prices are?