The initial search identified 4,364 outputs, most of them (n = 4,347) through databases (Scopus: 1986; Web of Science: 930; PsychInfo: 619; PubMed: 606; ERIC: 70; OneSearch: 136). The titles and abstracts of all 4,364 outputs were examined for relevancy, leading to the exclusion of 4,280 publications due to duplication or unsuitability for the present review. The full texts of the remaining 84 papers were then examined for eligibility based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Of these 84 papers, 57 were excluded for not meeting the eligibility criteria, including not using screening instruments for problematic gaming (n = 12), using academic performance as demographic information so the relationship between problematic gaming and academic performance was not tested (n = 2), not using student grades or GPA to assess academic performance objectively (n = 16), not mentioning how academic performance was assessed (n = 7), being a scale validation study (n = 4), being a review study (n = 3) or the full text was not written in English (n = 13). After completing the full-text screening process, a total of 27 studies were selected to be included in this systematic review. The full selection process is depicted in the PRISMA flow diagram (Fig. 1).

The key characteristics (i.e., study design, country, sample size, gender distribution (%), age range and mean age, sample characteristics, academic performance assessment, problematic gaming assessment) and main results of all 27 included studies can be found in the summary tables (see Tables 1 and 2).

With regard to the geographic characteristics, the data of the included studies were collected from 18 countries. Seven studies were from Türkiye (Ciris et al., 2022; Durak et al., 2022; Ekşi et al., 2020; Polat & Topal, 2022; Sahin et al., 2016; Toker & Baturay, 2016; Zorbaz et al., 2015), two from China (Yang et al., 2022; Zhang et al., 2019), two from Lebanon (Hawi et al., 2018; Samaha & Hawi, 2020), two from the United States (Gentile, 2009; Schmitt & Livingston, 2015), one from India (Suryawanshi et al., 2021), one from Indonesia (Karnadi & Pangestu, 2021), one from Malaysia (Jaafar et al., 2021), one from Pakistan (Zahra et al., 2020), one from Saudi Arabia (Al Asqah et al., 2020), one from Canada (Shi et al., 2019), one from Netherlands (Van Den Eijnden et al., 2018), one from Egypt (ELNahas et al., 2018), one from Germany (Rehbein et al., 2015), one from Norway (Brunborg et al., 2014), one from Iran (Haghbin et al., 2013), one from South Korea (Jeong & Kim, 2011), one from Singapore (Skoric et al., 2009), and one from Taiwan (Chiu et al., 2004).

The 27 studies reviewed comprised a total of 24,794 participants. Approximately half of the total number of participants were males (n = 12,982; 52.36%). The majority of studies had similar percentages of male and female participants, and only one study recruited males exclusively due to conducting the study at an all-male university (Schmitt & Livingston, 2015). The sample sizes of the reviewed studies varied between 91 and 11,003 participants. Five studies had more than 1000 participants (Brunborg et al., 2014; Chiu et al., 2004; Gentile, 2009; Rehbein et al., 2015; Shi et al., 2019), five studies had more than 500 to 1000 participants (Ciris et al., 2022; ELNahas et al., 2018; Hawi et al., 2018; Jeong & Kim, 2011; Van Den Eijnden et al., 2018), nine studies had more than 300 to 500 participants (Haghbin et al., 2013; Jaafar et al., 2021; Karnadi & Pangestu, 2021; Sahin et al., 2016; Samaha & Hawi, 2020; Schmitt & Livingston, 2015; Skoric et al., 2009; Zahra et al., 2020; Zorbaz et al., 2015), five studies had more than 200 to 300 participants (Al Asqah et al., 2020; Durak et al., 2022; Ekşi et al., 2020; Polat & Topal, 2022; Zhang et al., 2019) and the remaining three studies had less than 200 participants (Suryawanshi et al., 2021; Toker & Baturay, 2016; Yang et al., 2022).

Regarding the age of the participants and the sample group, eleven studies recruited college or university students aged 18 to 27 years (Al Asqah et al., 2020; ELNahas et al., 2018; Jaafar et al., 2021; Karnadi & Pangestu, 2021; Samaha & Hawi, 2020; Schmitt & Livingston, 2015; Suryawanshi et al., 2021; Toker & Baturay, 2016; Yang et al., 2022; Zahra et al., 2020; Zhang et al., 2019), ten studies recruited students aged 8 to 18 years from primary, middle and/or high schools (Brunborg et al., 2014; Durak et al., 2022; Ekşi et al., 2020; Gentile, 2009; Hawi et al., 2018; Jeong & Kim, 2011; Rehbein et al., 2015; Sahin et al., 2016; Skoric et al., 2009; Van Den Eijnden et al., 2018), and six studies did not provide information about the participants’ age, but the authors indicated that the participants were school students in grades 5–8 (Chiu et al., 2004), in grades 4 and 5 (Zorbaz et al., 2015), in grades 7–12 (Shi et al., 2019), in grades 9–12 (Ciris et al., 2022), in grades 5 and 6 (Polat & Topal, 2022), and high-school students (Haghbin et al., 2013).

To assess student academic performance, the reviewed studies used self-reported GPA (Al Asqah et al., 2020; Ciris et al., 2022; Durak et al., 2022; Ekşi et al., 2020; Haghbin et al., 2013; Hawi et al., 2018; Jaafar et al., 2021; Jeong & Kim, 2011; Karnadi & Pangestu, 2021; Polat & Topal, 2022; Sahin et al., 2016; Samaha & Hawi, 2020; Schmitt & Livingston, 2015; Toker & Baturay, 2016; Van Den Eijnden et al., 2018; Yang et al., 2022; Zhang et al., 2019; Zorbaz et al., 2015), self-reported school grades (Brunborg et al., 2014; Gentile,