For two years, SOOP held a quiet edge over Chzzk. Chzzk had more channels, more raw growth, but SOOP kept winning where it actually counted: how much time people spent watching.
That changed in the second week of June. According to Mobile Index data, Chzzk pulled in 9.4 million hours of smartphone usage, enough to pass SOOP for the first time since launch. The reason isn't a mystery. Naver is streaming every single match of the 2026 World Cup on Chzzk, and people are showing up for it. The Mexico match alone hit 4.78 million concurrent viewers.
It's a big number, but it's not really surprising. Naver has been stacking up broadcast rights for over a year now: the Esports World Cup, the Olympics, the LCK, and now the FIFA World Cup. Each one pulls in viewers who might not normally open the app. The World Cup is just the biggest one yet.
SOOP isn't standing still either
While Chzzk rides the World Cup wave, SOOP has its own lineup. It picked up global rights to the KBO League, signed KT Rolster for the next two years, and is still the exclusive home for a chunk of LCK broadcasts. SOOP's strength has always been its creators and its community features, and that hasn't gone anywhere.
So this isn't really a story about one platform winning and the other losing. It's two platforms with different strategies, and right now, Chzzk's strategy happens to line up with the biggest sporting event on the planet.
The real challenge: what happens after
Here's the part that matters more long term. Big events bring in viewers, but they don't always keep them. Naver itself has flagged user retention after major events as an open problem. People show up for the World Cup final, then drift off once the tournament ends and there's no big match to watch.
This is where VODs and highlights actually matter. A live match disappears the moment it's over unless you're watching at exactly the right time. If you want to revisit a goal, a big play, or a match you missed, having that content saved somewhere you control makes it a lot easier to stay engaged with a platform between big events instead of just during them.
Watching on Chzzk or SOOP
Whichever platform you're following, Vodloader works with both. If you want to grab highlights or VODs to watch again later, here's how to download from Chzzk or SOOP, depending on where you're watching.
The World Cup will keep driving viewership for both platforms through mid-July. After that, the real test starts: which one keeps people coming back.