May 2025 USA Sales: PS5 the Only Console with Growth as Xbox Price Hike Proves Costly

@ShogunRok This maybe a silly question, but are these for Digital or physical?

Thankfully you pointed out the very obvious reason with Nintendo but its very clear that Xbox hardware is heading in only one direction, which in turn tells us why they're effectively just becoming a 3rd party publisher

@Oram77 These charts track both physical and digital sales unless otherwise stated. So they provide much better insight than the UK and Japanese charts, for example.

Can you imagine increasing the price of your console while it still sells like a bag if warm piss. I'd love to been in that board meeting and all agreeing they should increase the price of xbox console

None of the 4 Microsoft games in the Top 5 have an actual, legitimate physical release. Disgusting

With all the talk of Doom underperforming, it's great to see it ranking at #2 behind a heavily-hyped Elein Ring spinoff.

@Uromastryx Yep. With all the money they claim to have you'd think they'd take the losses and sell the console way cheaper than the PS5, kinda like the 360 era.

TloU Part 2 in 17th spot? I guess the 2nd season is a success when comes to attract more newcomers to try Part 2.

But i'm surprised to see Capcom Fighting Collection 2 in 19th spot. I wonder if that's enough for Capcom to greenlight CvS 3, a new Project Justice, a new Power Stone, or a new Star Gladiator...

@Medic_alert Maybe after next gen, it's hard to say, although they might get another company to do hardware for them like ASUS after thier own console later this decade.

@Balaam_ appalling isn’t it. I wouldn’t buy any of them anyway being linked to that scummy company

@TheArt they need to do something to shift units or be literally millions just sitting still in the next generation, but it would be better for them go outsource the console this time

And don't forget Minecraft so actually have 5 titles in the top 10. When it comes to Xbox, you don't need to buy the Hardware and their messaging keeps reiterating that - this is an Xbox, this is an Xbox - So whilst they aren't making money from all the 3rd Party 'Hardware' you can play Xbox on, they are making Money through their OWN platform on those devices.

Game Pass Cloud is a Microsoft Platform - albeit a more 'Virtual' Xbox, but you must Subscribe in order to play 'Xbox' on whatever device - play on Xbox hardware built into servers.

PC is a Multi-platform device - you have Steam as one of the most well known PC Platforms, but you also have Epic, Battlenet, Bethesda.net (those last two are now owned by Microsoft) and of course you have Microsoft Windows/Game Pass PC. If you buy on Xbox, you get to play on ANY Microsoft Platform - you don't get the 'Steam' PC version. If you buy CoD from Steam, you play on Steam, buy CoD from Battlenet, you can't play on Steam despite it also selling the PC version. So Microsoft have their OWN PC Platform too - unlike Sony who 'could' but choose to use 3rd Party Platforms - never Microsoft platforms. That's why you can play Spider-man on Steam or Epic with Steam/Epic being the PC Platform you play on, its not on Battlenet or Microsofts PC Platform.

Therefore MS has more than one Platform - not just their Console. Whether that is a 'good/bad' thing is dependent on your view, but My Xbox Profile is my Windows PC Profile and Game Pass Profile. My Games, game saves and achievements all carry across and progress. Its just one 'Ecosystem' - it would be like you signing into your Sony account on a Handheld or PC and being able to play Playstation' games, your progression and trophies are all carried across etc. But Sony only have their Console. Yes MS may also use 3rd Party Platforms on PC - like Steam, but they have their Own and its linked with their Game Pass PC platform - the games, DLC and everything is Sold through MS and you get the Xbox Console version too with Play Anywhere.

MS may not 'need' to sell 100m consoles to have 100m users on their Platform. They could sell 35m Consoles with 8m accessing via Cloud and 57m in their PC (not Steam/Epic) Platform for example around the world...

I only care about the Games, not the Hardware or brand on the box, I couldn't care less who publishes or even who made a game, I just care about being able to play the Games I want, when I want - I have a PS5, XSX and PC because I need all those for ALL the games I want to play despite the fact that '90%' are playable on just 1. I couldn't care less if MS decided to copy Sega and drop out of the Console business and wouldn't care if Sony did too. As long as I can still play all the new Games I want and/or the Games I already own, and preferably without needing multiple Consoles, the better. I don't want to have to buy multiple Hardware - so I doubt I'll buy the next Xbox (unless it is more PC and 'better' than my current PC) and maybe won't buy a PS6 if Sony continue to release games on Steam - I don't need to play Day 1 and have to pay to play online, play with friends etc.

@Scribedby so that infers that nintendo is direct competition to sony right? i thought that nintendo was “doing its own thing” ?

Xbox players think this multiplatform strategy is great for xbox well not really for them because now every exclusive is coming to PS5 and ppl instead of buying an xbox they all flock to ps5 "hey you wanna play Forza just buy a ps5 you wanna play gears just buy a ps5" and the ridiculous price increase didn't help either

I'm sure the Xbox will be quite cheap when they pull the plug and sell off the old stock

@Lowdefal A cameo / guest isn't the same as a crossover game. Terry and Mai in SF 6 have their iconic moves but their playing style adapting to how SF works which plays quite different compare to their KOF / Fatal Fury version. I bet Ken and Chun Li in CotW will plays different too.

And CvS is a team based 3v3 while SF and Fatal Fury is 1v1. With CvS, Capcom and SNK characters can team up and that would create plenty of playing style and strategies that doesn't exist in 1v1.

Plus, they also can go nuts with new mechanic. Like CvS 2 for example, Capcom wouldn't put the ratio system in a SF game cause that would break how SF plays.

So a new CvS isn't pointless and i bet a lot of fighting game fans will be hype af.

Well with digital libraries and default console or games that appeal to people, sure why not....... then Xbox's bad marketing, third party formula games why would I care for an Xbox or to play their boring games, ok Impulse Triggers on the controller that few games support and otherwise just a fair besides PC device to have?

Hi Fi Rush was fine, South of Midnight was fine and Forza Motorsport I WANTED to be good but was so bad I refuse to support it. I doubt an offline update will happen for it either. Let alone GT7 like GT Sport did either.

Other then for me to put CDs in something more modern then a PS3/360 with an Xbox One/Series eshop app or to listen to music and ignore Spotify to use what I WANT.

To me the Xbox is just an ok device to have for some things, but not a lot that exciting. It's storefront has more apps then PS?Nintendo so that's nice but yeah that or back compat isn't enough for people, only certain audiences.

I like the console competition but yeah if Xbox is just a third party fully I'll be sad. I think the console helps, Sony can be particular and while I don't like what they do at all currently it will get worse.

While the PS5 is just a boring console, with boring ideas, ok controller, bad OS and games that are just PS4 formula games i hated with more graphics focus, yeah nah pass.

I already hated the PS4 gen, the OS design is great, the game library is bad.

@kmtrain83 I can see a day when you are playing on your 'Virtual' Playstation/Xbox/Nintendo depending on which platform you signed into that allows you to play games. The actual game won't be running locally and you'll have a Digital library with each you have an account with.

If Sony had a Playstation app on PC that you could download your games and play on day/date at the best your PC can play it, even though that's locked to Sony as their OWN Platform, it would hurt their Hardware sales so I really don't see why they expect MS to keep pace with Single Platforms. Microsoft have basically added more platforms so they are not limited to or limited by Console Sales - they don't need to sell consoles to sell Game Pass, but the Only Console its on is Xbox for example.

Cloud may not be quite ready for 'mainstream' gamers but the infrastructure is improving and technology too. With Hardware and Software going up in price, Cloud could become the only option for the more budget limited rather than buy another $500+ Base Console requiring a $5 a month Subscription to play online with friends when they can spend $20 and play on ANY device, inc their TV and have access to hundreds of games that month and decide next month if you can spend another $20 for another month.

Gone are the '$300' consoles and Console gamers expectations are very high leading to increasing costs as they try to keep up with the latest technology to play the latest games because they don't make enough games to sell their own console on its own. Nintendo still make a 'relatively' affordable Console but won't get the Latest games and the few it will probably won't be Day 1 but heavily scaled down ports.

This chart is barely more insightful than the UK chart. If it only includes digital sales for PlayStation then it may as well be just a PlayStation chart.

One question, are those top 10s based on number of units sold or $ value? I’d always assumed that if charts included digital sales (based on no. of units sold), you’d just see all the tat games at the top that sell for a few quid but sell loads, as opposed to the proper games which sell for a much higher price but lower volumes. Maybe I’m wrong.

Nightreign topping the charts is impressive. I haven’t put much time into a From game since Demon’s Souls (I will tackle Elden Ring some day when I am feeling the need to get my teeth kicked in 😋) but commercially From hasn’t missed in a long while. Lots of SP studios decide ‘I can do multiplayer too’ but few succeed.

I’m a little saddened but unsurprised by the fact Days Gone Remastered (in stark contrast to Oblivion which also hit at the tail end of April) doesn’t seem to have charted. Days Gone eventually shaped up to be a good game (the rough state in which it launched is pretty common now but was unusual at the time) but it had the bad luck to be released in the same timeframe as The Last of Us (a better game and one which launched in a finished state) and unfortunately for Days TLOU still looms large. Dealing with a massive horde of running zombies is great fun though so maybe like the original game the Days Gone Remaster will have decent legs.

Moving on to hardware, sales estimates from Installed Base put the number of PS5s sold at 225, vs 75K Switch 1s (Switch 2’s launch was imminent) and 70K Xboxes.

Like I’ve noted before Sony is now the only one of the three committed to the old ‘subsidized hardware one plugs into a tv’ model. The Switches are strong rivals but they make power and storage concessions in order to maintain portability. As for the Xbox MS seems to be cutting bait in the game division. While gaming forum dwellers talk about lots of stuff (Gamepass, layoffs, exclusivity etc) IMHO for casual gamers the important bits are higher than the competition HW prices and the very expensive proprietary storage.

https://www.installbaseforum.com/forums/threads/circana-may-2025-1-elden-ring-nightreign-2-doom-dark-ages-15-f1-25-19-capcom-fight-collection-2-ps5-1-units-rev-up-yoy-console-unit.3871/#post-338254

PS5: ~225K
NSW: ~75K
XBS: ~70K

@Carnage casual gamers tend to buy whichever console is the most popular. HW prices and expensive storage don't matter as much. Apple is proof that people will pay any amount of money for a product that is seen as desirable.

@naruball I don’t pay much attention to smartphones but I see a lot of IPhones and Androids IRL (I live in the US) and a Google search indicates Samsung currently edges out Apple as the biggest cellphone maker (20% global marketshare vs 19%).

Moving back to consoles, I can think of multiple instances in recent history where price has had a strong impact on sales. The PS1 was a hundred bucks cheaper than the Saturn, the X360 launched $200 cheaper than the PS3 and the PS4 launched a hundred dollars cheaper than the Xbox One.

Don’t get me wrong games are king (no matter the price people won’t buy something if it doesn’t appeal to them) but price matters quite a bit because the vast majority of people live within budgets.

https://www.counterpointresearch.com/insights/global-smartphone-share/

@Carnage The difference is very small globally, but Apple seems to be leading in the US at least:

https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/us-smartphone-market-share

My point was that the high price of Apple (and Samsung) products does not prevent them from selling by far the best. In other words, even in this economy, people will pay a high price, if they think the product is worth it for whatever reason (best specs, best design, "all my friends have it and I don't want to feel left out", etc).

"I can think of multiple instances in recent history where price has had a strong impact on sales."

Correlation =/= causation
Simply put, we don't know the impact that it had. Maybe it was a deciding factor, maybe not. It's hard, if not impossible, to tell.

"Don’t get me wrong games are king"
Ideally that would be the case. But then again, people seem to buy primarily third party games, like Fifa/CoD, Hogwarts, etc. They just buy the same console as their friends either so that they can play together or because that's what their friends have. If memory serves, most ps3 first party games didn't sell particularly well. Neither did ps2 first party games. Remember, what Phil Spencer said about the race to 10m being the most important?

When the brand is strong, companies can get away with anything (faulty models, high prices, etc).

@naruball People buying 3rd party games doesn’t mean games aren’t king. Especially in the era of crossplay it supports my argument that HW pricing is important because if people can play the games they are interested in on multiple systems they will look at the price and performance/power of the systems and make a choice.

As for first party Playstation games I’m not sure I understand your point but if you are saying that third party games have always played a massive role in driving PlayStation hardware sales, I agree though I’ll add that is true of every system (there is generally a positive relationship between developer support and HW sales).

Brand strength is a thing but it’s not immutable. Stupid mistakes, bad decisions or just bad luck have pushed a lot of companies that used to be household names into extinction (think Blockbuster, General Motors, Borders, MySpace, Toys r Us and Pam Am).

@kmtrain83 I don't know about MS buying Nintendo - Nintendo could continue to make Hardware but you won't be playing the latest games 'locally' on it. They may continue to make their games and choose to only make them 'accessible' on Hardware or through their Digital platform.

At the moment, Cloud cannot surpass Hardware in quality but it can enable those on older or weaker hardware to play games that won't run on their Hardware. Xbox Cloud is 'better' than XB1S native ports (Some are Higher Res, Higher quality settings and higher Frame Rates as its the 'Series S' version - FH5) and other games never got released on their Hardware. You can play Starfield on a XB1S - hardware it doesn't run on.

From an economic perspective, as well as environmental (Carbon Footprint) and sustainability perspectives, building Consoles is getting tougher. Silicon is in high demand, let alone all the plastics, the copper, rare elements and of course even the fuel costs to distribute them globally is an issue today, let alone a decade from now. If you put a 1TB SSD in every Console, that's 100,000,000+ TB's of Storage you need to 'buy', get delivered, install into your hardware, ship out and sell to retailers at lower cost so they can sell it to you at the price it is?

They could build Servers and use a fraction of that 100m TB's Storage to save money - that's more than all the Playstation or Xbox Games ever made combined would occupy so Save money. Their Platform becomes a Digital Platform that is now accessible ANYWHERE you can sign in and play games. Your entire 'Digital' Library is locked to your digital profile so you can 'access' every game you've bought because the License is on your account, not some bit of Plastic.

Games like MSFS cannot fit on a Disc or your own Hardware locally because it has the entire Earth at 1:1 scale - that has to be 'streamed'. Indiana Jones alone is bigger than can fit on a disc and discs are an environmental hazard.

Unless Quantum Computing enables some form of cheap Hardware that can surpass Internet Quality to entice gamers, because I can just see that hardware becoming too expensive to appeal to the masses - so either for very dedicated enthusiast or most affluent gamers. The quality of Streaming will improve and you don't need hardware, storage etc and can play 'anywhere' inc your big screen TV you plug your console into and games can be so much bigger, better, more if they are 'not' limited to running on 'limited' hardware that restricts developers in so many ways to realise their games.