Only 0.5% of Hearthstone players reach Legend rank

Blizzard has released a bit of data on people who play Ranked mode in Hearthstone, revealing that only a tiny minority of players ever hit Legend rank and that the vast majority of players sit somewhere between ranks 25 and 15.

"Recently, we've seen some comments from our players that feel they are not performing well in Ranked Play compared to others, or disappointed by the fact that they haven't hit Legend rank," the developer wrote on the Hearthstone blog by way of introduction.

"We're here to let you know that you're actually doing better than you think! In fact, most of Hearthstone's Ranked Play players lie between Ranks 25 and 15. Many players aspire to acquire the unique Hearthstone card back each season that awaits at Rank 20. Even going from Rank 20 to Rank 15 is an impressive feat."

As you can see from the adjacent infographic, the top 15 ranks really separate the Mountain Giants from the Angry Chickens. 75% of players achieve something between 25 and 15, after which 17.5% of Ranked players punch their way through to 15-10.

From rank 10 upwards, it's just 7.5% of Hearthstone players. "The competition heats up the closer players get to Rank 5, and win streaks become less and less common. Players here are fine-tuning their decks and predicting their opponent's plays, ready to answer with their own onslaught of spells and minions!"

Inevitably it really heats up the closer you get to Legend, although while 2% of players are between ranks 5 and 1, only 0.5% reach the elusive Legend rank that lies beyond, securing that fabled card back and presumably becoming minor celebrities on Twitch.

It seems crazy to think Hearthstone only graduated from its lengthy beta test as recently as March, but there you go. Since then Blizzard has released the Curse of Naxxramas expansion, introducing more single-player content and 30 new cards, and the developer recently announced that Hearthstone itself has now been downloaded by 20 million players.