Exit Games
Exit Games operates Photon Engine, a cloud-hosted multiplayer networking platform serving 1 million+ game developers and Fortune 500 enterprises. It monetizes via freemium-to-enterprise subscription tiers spanning real-time state sync, deterministic engines, chat, voice, and tournament infrastructure.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2004
- HeadquartersHamburg, Germany
- Headcount11–50
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingSoftware
What Exit Games does
Exit Games is a German technology company founded in 2003 and headquartered in Hamburg, Germany, that develops and operates Photon Engine, a cloud-based multiplayer game networking platform. The company serves more than 800,000 to 1 million game developers and studios globally, with Photon Cloud hosting over 1.4 billion monthly players and 1.37 million+ applications across 16 global regions including Asia, Europe, North America, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East. Its customer base spans indie developers to Fortune 500 enterprises, including gaming leaders (Ubisoft, Square Enix, Bandai Namco, Miniclip, Voodoo), breakout hits (Stumble Guys, Gorilla Tag, VRChat, Phasmophobia, Golf Clash, Rec Room), and industrial clients (Airbus, Honeywell, Daimler, Volkswagen, Vodafone, Adobe, Epiroc, Spatial). The company operates dual entities: Exit Games GmbH (Hamburg, HRB 85991) and Exit Games Inc. (Portland, Oregon), and employs 11-50 people.
The Photon product suite is organized around three multiplayer networking engines: Fusion for high-performance state synchronization supporting 200+ players per session, Quantum as a 100% deterministic predict/rollback engine for physics-intensive and competitive gameplay, and Realtime as a low-level API foundation providing matchmaking, NAT punch-through, rooms, and encryption. Communication modules include Chat (cross-platform messaging) and Voice (low-latency audio with 3D audio and noise reduction), with a Tournament layer for competitive infrastructure. Legacy PUN (Photon Unity Networking), Unity's "Most Downloaded Asset," now sits in maintenance mode after being succeeded by Fusion and Quantum. SDKs support Unity, Unreal Engine, Godot, and Cocos, with deployment across mobile (iOS, Android), PC, consoles (PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo, Apple TV), and VR/AR (Meta Quest).
Revenue is generated through a freemium-to-enterprise pricing model. Developers start on a free 20-CCU development tier and graduate through PUN Plus ($95 one-time, 100 CCU), Public Cloud subscriptions at 500/1,000/2,000 CCU, Premium Cloud at $0.29/CCU ($580/month minimum), and Enterprise Cloud with custom SLAs and dedicated servers. Distribution combines a product-led growth motion via the Unity Asset Store and self-serve dashboard with direct enterprise sales for Premium and Enterprise tiers, plus Gaming Circle and Industries Circle premium support programs. In August 2021, Skillz acquired a minority stake in Exit Games for $50 million to access Photon's multiplayer technology for its own competitive gaming roadmap. The company holds GDPR, CCPA, CPRA, VCDPA, CPA, CTDPA, and UCPA compliance certifications.
Exit Games firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Exit Games
- Legal name
- Exit Games GmbH
- Website
- https://photonengine.com
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2004
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 11–50 employees
- Short description
- Exit Games operates Photon Engine, a cloud-hosted multiplayer networking platform serving 1 million+ game developers and Fortune 500 enterprises. It monetizes via freemium-to-enterprise subscription tiers spanning real-time state sync, deterministic engines, chat, voice, and tournament infrastructure.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Exit Games industry classification
Industry- Product category
- Multiplayer game backend and real-time networking platform
- NAICS
- Computer Systems Design and Related Services (54151)
- SIC
- Services-Computer Programming Services (7371)
- akta.pro primary industry
- Networking, Multiplayer & Backend Middleware (MPAFAFAE)
Keywords
Where Exit Games is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Hamburg
- HQ country
- Germany
- HQ region
- Europe
Offices2 records
Markets served
Exit Games business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales
Revenue model
- Photon Cloud Subscription Plans: Usage-based and subscription-based pricing tiers for multiplayer cloud services. Customers start with free tiers for development and pay as their game scales. Tiers range from free (20 CCU, development only) to Premium Cloud ($0.29/CCU, minimum $580/month for 2,000 CCU) to Enterprise Cloud with dedicated servers and SLAs. Additional revenue from CCU burst overages, traffic overages, and one-time 12-month plans.
- Photon Cloud Usage-Based: 100% usage-based pricing on CCU (concurrent users) and data transfer. Customers pay per CCU above their tier allowance and per GB of traffic beyond included limits. Burst CCU overages billed at tier rates.
- Photon Unity Networking (PUN) Product Sales: PUN Plus sold as a one-time purchase ($95) for 100 CCU Photon Cloud plan valid 12 months, plus Unity Asset Store distribution. Revenue from the sale of PUN Plus packages through Unity Asset Store and direct sales.
- Enterprise Cloud & Professional Services: Enterprise Cloud provides dedicated server environments with guaranteed SLAs, premium DDoS protection, priority operations support, and server-authoritative logic via plugins. Additional revenue from Gaming Circle and Industries Circle premium support programs offering direct engineering support and exclusive samples.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Freemium | Monthly | Free Development Plan — 20 CCU |
| One time/ perpetual license | Multi-year contract | PUN Plus One-Time Plan — 100 CCU |
| Subscription | Monthly | Public Cloud — 500 CCU |
| Subscription | Monthly | Public Cloud — 1,000 CCU |
| Subscription | Monthly | Public Cloud — 2,000 CCU |
| Usage-based | Monthly | Premium Cloud — Per CCU |
| Subscription | Monthly | Enterprise Cloud |
Go-to-market motion2 records
Distribution channels4 records
Marketing channels7 records
Exit Games product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Exit Games develops and operates the Photon Engine, a cloud-hosted real-time multiplayer platform that provides networking, matchmaking, voice, chat, and dedicated game server infrastructure for game studios and enterprise customers. The platform is delivered through a suite of SDK-based products (Photon Fusion, Quantum, Realtime, Chat, Voice, PUN, Tournament) that developers integrate into their games and applications to power online multiplayer, social, and real-time experiences at global scale.
Product overview
Exit Games provides Photon Engine, a comprehensive multiplayer game development platform offering multiple SDKs and cloud services. The product portfolio includes three tiers: Quantum (100% deterministic predict/rollback engine for Unity), Fusion (high-performance state-sync engine supporting 200 players), and Realtime (low-level API foundation). Communication add-ons include Chat and Voice for cross-platform text and audio. Classic products include PUN (Unity networking, now maintenance mode) and Bolt (discontinued). All products run on the globally distributed Photon Cloud with automatic scaling, supplemented by Enterprise Cloud for dedicated resources. Gaming Circle provides premium developer support.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Brands
- Photon Fusion: High-end state synchronization networking engine with snapshot interpolation, full prediction systems, lag compensation, and high player count support.
- Photon Quantum
- Photon Realtime
- Photon Unity Networking (PUN)
- Photon Chat
- Photon Voice
- Photon Tournament
Products and services
- Photon Fusion
- Photon Quantum Photon Quantum is a deterministic multiplayer engine that uses an Entity Component System (ECS) and server-authoritative rollback netcode to power competitive action, real-time strategy, and sports games. It is designed for game developers who need fully deterministic, lockstep-style multiplayer simulations with authoritative server logic.
- Photon Realtime Photon Realtime is a real-time multiplayer networking SDK that provides lobbies, matchmaking, and low-latency relay communication for turn-based and casual multiplayer games. It is used by game developers to quickly add online multiplayer to casual, social, card, and board games across mobile, PC, and console platforms.
- Photon Chat Photon Chat is a cloud-hosted chat service that provides scalable in-app and in-game messaging with public, private, and group channels. It is used by game studios and app developers to add social text chat features without building and operating their own chat infrastructure.
- Photon Voice Photon Voice is a real-time voice communication SDK for multiplayer games and social applications, supporting low-latency voice chat, positional 3D audio, and echo cancellation. It enables game developers to integrate high-quality voice communication directly into multiplayer experiences on Photon's global infrastructure.
- Photon Unity Networking (PUN) Photon Unity Networking (PUN) is the original Unity multiplayer networking SDK that connects Unity games to the Photon Cloud, providing rooms, matchmaking, and remote procedure calls. It is targeted at Unity developers who need a straightforward, well-documented way to add online multiplayer to their games; the product is in maintenance mode with developers encouraged to migrate to Photon Fusion.
- Photon Tournament Photon Tournament is a skill-based tournament and matchmaking service that allows developers to run competitive bracketed and round-robin tournaments inside their multiplayer games. It is designed for game studios that want to add eSports-style and ranked competitive events without building their own tournament infrastructure.
- Photon Enterprise Cloud Photon Enterprise Cloud is a dedicated, private deployment of the Photon platform that provides custom SLAs, dedicated regions, and white-glove support for large game publishers and enterprise customers. It is targeted at large studios and enterprises that require isolated infrastructure, regulatory compliance, and high-touch support for mission-critical real-time applications.
Quantifiable outcome
- 1.4 billion monthly players hosted on Photon Cloud
- +5 more outcomes
Companies that use Exit Games
Customer profileNamed customers22 records
Segments2 records
Ideal customer profiles2 records
Exit Games technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- Yes
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration17 records
AI capability1 record
Feature9 records
Exit Games partnerships and signals
Strategic signalScale indicators6 records
Recent moves6 records
Expansion highlights6 records
Exit Games competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- AccelByte: Backend platform for multiplayer games offering matchmaking, session management, leaderboards, and live ops. Closely comparable to Photon in serving game studios with cross-platform multiplayer infrastructure and developer-friendly SDKs.
- Heroic Labs (Nakama): Open-source game server framework offering multiplayer, matchmaking, chat, and leaderboards with both self-hosted and managed options. Competes directly with Photon Realtime and Photon Chat for multiplayer middleware workloads.
- Pragma: Game backend engine providing multiplayer matchmaking, social, economy, and live ops APIs as a backend-as-a-service. Closely comparable to Photon's game-studio value proposition for studios wanting a turnkey backend.
Emerging players
- Hathora: Cloud-native multiplayer game server orchestration platform offering auto-scaling dedicated servers. Competes with Photon's Enterprise Cloud / dedicated-server tier for studios scaling beyond CCU-based relay.
- Mirror Networking: Open-source Unity networking library used by indie developers as a free alternative to Photon Fusion/Realtime. Targets the same Unity multiplayer developer audience that constitutes Photon's SMB install base.
- FishNet Networking: Unity networking solution supporting multiple topologies and free self-hosting. Positioned as a lower-cost alternative to Photon Fusion for Unity developers building multiplayer games.
Broad incumbents
- Epic Online Services (EOS): Epic's free suite of online services including matchmaking, lobbies, voice, and cross-play that competes with Photon's pricing model. Particularly relevant for Unreal Engine developers who might otherwise default to Photon.
- AWS GameLift: Amazon's managed dedicated game server hosting service for session-based multiplayer. Overlaps with Photon Cloud's infrastructure layer, particularly for studios needing dedicated server hosting rather than client-to-server relay.
- Unity Multiplayer Services (NetCode for GameObjects / Multiplayer Tools): Unity's first-party multiplayer stack integrated into the Unity engine. Most direct competitive threat to Photon's Unity-centric business, leveraging native engine integration and bundling advantages.
- Microsoft PlayFab: Microsoft's game backend-as-a-service offering providing multiplayer servers, leaderboards, matchmaking, and live ops integrated with Azure. Directly comparable to Photon Cloud as a managed backend for game studios, but with broader enterprise/cloud reach.
Market position
Strengths5 records
Weaknesses5 records
Competitive moat6 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights7 records
Customer concentration
Exit Games social profiles
Digital presenceExit Games compliance and trust
Trust signalCompliance8 records
Exit Games financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Exit Games leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles3 records
Exit Games funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds5 records
Investors5 records
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Exit Games M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about Exit Games
What does Exit Games do?
Exit Games develops and operates the Photon Engine, a cloud-hosted real-time multiplayer platform that provides networking, matchmaking, voice, chat, and dedicated game server infrastructure for game studios and enterprise customers. The platform is delivered through a suite of SDK-based products (Photon Fusion, Quantum, Realtime, Chat, Voice, PUN, Tournament) that developers integrate into their games and applications to power online multiplayer, social, and real-time experiences at global scale.
Is Exit Games a public or private company?
Exit Games is a private company. It is classified as venture growth investor backed and is currently operating.
When was Exit Games founded?
Exit Games was founded in 2004. It employs 11 to 50 people.
Where is Exit Games based?
Exit Games is headquartered in Hamburg, Germany, in the Europe region.
How does Exit Games make money?
Four revenue lines are on record. Photon Cloud Subscription Plans are the primary driver. The others are photon Cloud Usage-Based, photon Unity Networking (PUN) Product Sales and enterprise Cloud & Professional Services.
Who are Exit Games's main competitors?
Direct peers on record are AccelByte, Heroic Labs (Nakama) and Pragma. Emerging players are Hathora, Mirror Networking and FishNet Networking. Broad incumbents are Epic Online Services (EOS), AWS GameLift, Unity Multiplayer Services (NetCode for GameObjects / Multiplayer Tools) and Microsoft PlayFab.
Does Exit Games have an API?
Yes. Exit Games provides Photon SDKs in multiple languages (C#, C++, Objective-C, JavaScript/TypeScript, Lua/Corona) for building multiplayer games. The platform supports Realtime API, Chat API, Voice API, and provides webhook capabilities for room control and backend integration. The C# Realtime API enables matchmaking, room management, custom properties, and low-latency relay. All applications run in Photon Cloud with client-to-server architecture. Developer documentation is at doc.photonengine.com.
What industry is Exit Games in?
Exit Games's product category is Multiplayer game backend and real-time networking platform. Its primary akta.pro industry code is MPAFAFAE, Networking, Multiplayer & Backend Middleware. Its NAICS code is 54151 and its SIC code is 7371.