Does gaming longer make you happier? How many hours of gaming in a day would it take to make you happy? One, two, three, 24? Well, according to a study made by the Oxford Internet Institute (via BBC), gaming longer does not make you happier.

The research conducted by the Oxford Internet Institute on a whopping 39,000 gamers was to investigate how the amount of gaming time affects the well-being of a gamer. The conclusion is that it really doesn’t. According to the study, the average player would have to play for 10 hours more than usual per day to notice any difference and the reasons for playing were far more likely to have an impact on a gamer’s well-being.

What that means is that it’s up to you how much gaming time makes you happy. Some people can be satisfied with just one hour or less of gaming per day. Professor Andrew Przybylski (who conducted the study) said:

“Common sense says if you have more free time to play video games, you’re probably a happier person.

But contrary to what we might think about games being good or bad for us, we found [in this latest study] pretty conclusive evidence that how much you play doesn’t really have any bearing whatsoever on changes in well-being.

If players were playing because they wanted to, rather than because they felt compelled to, they had to, they tended to feel better.”

The study took data and information from companies such as Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo, who provided six weeks’ worth of data with the consent of 39,000 players. This came from six games, including Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Apex Legends, Eve Online, Forza Horizon 4, Gran Turismo Sport and The Crew 2.

There you have it, folks. You don’t have to play games all day or for hours in a single sitting, or work your butt off trying to get that Platinum trophy that no one but yourself really cares about, in order to be happy. How many hours of gaming a day would make you happy? Let us know in the comments below.