World of Warcraft subscription numbers have been fluctuating greatly over the past few years. The user base has been in steady decline since 2010, when it was at its peak of over 12 million subscribers.

Third quarter 2014 has shown an increase of 600,000 after losing 800,000 in the period ending June 30, 2014. During its earnings call in August, Blizzard predicted an uptick, with 1.5 million copies of the Warlords of Draenor expansion pre-ordered at that time.

The news that subscribers now total 7.4 million came in conjunction with news that update 6.0.2 has been released. This update, detailed here, is a prelude to the release of the new expansion on November 13.

Our Take
World of Warcraft is only one piece of the third quarter financial picture I’m interested in hearing about on the November 4 earnings call. Diablo III Ultimate Evil Edition and Hearthstone are sure to have made significant positive impacts on Blizzard’s finances.

Source: http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2014/10/14/world-of-warcraft-subscriptions-jump-600000-in-advance-of-warlords-of-draenor.aspx

Doom thread for Perspective:  http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread.php?id=188020&page=2#2

Good for blizzard imo. Warlords has not even released yet and subscribers are staying steady, and at a whopping 7.4m at that. Of course WoW will slowly die, but a lot slower then most think.

People quit their jobs or university just for playing this game. It was that popular. It still amazes me that so many people are still playing it.

this game is seriously a beast. it peaked long ago but even with its decline its still posting massive numbers.

Those days were Golden!! I remember I quit my job because I had trouble with a manager in 07... but WoW kept me from finding another one for 6 months!

Its good to see it can still move units and has at least more than half its base playing it... I still keep in touch with ppl I met in WoW for about 8 years now...

This happens every expansion AFAIK.

Tbh, I've been tempted to go back for this. The content looks really appealing, especially compared to Mists which was nothing like what I wanted.