PS5 vs Xbox Series X|S vs Switch Sales Comparison Charts Through March 27 - Sales
by William D'Angelo , posted on 09 April 2021 / 3,546 Views
Here we see data representing the global sales through to consumers and change in sales performance of the three current platforms (PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch) and three legacy platforms (PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo 3DS) over comparable periods for 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021. Also shown is the market share for each of the consoles over the same periods.
Year to Date Sales Comparison (Same Periods Covered)
Market Share (Same Periods Covered)
2018 – (Week ending January 13 to March 31)
2019 – (Week ending January 12 to March 30)
2020 – (Week ending January 11 to March 28)
2021 – (Week ending January 9 to March 27)
"Year to date" sales for 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 sales are shown in series at the top of the table and then just below a comparison of 2021 versus 2020 and 2021 versus 2019 is displayed. This provides an easy-to-view summary of all the data.
Total Sales and Market Share for Each Year
Microsoft
- Xbox One – Down Year-on-Year 512,135 (-66.9%)
- Xbox Series X|S – n/a
Nintendo
- Nintendo Switch - Up Year-on-Year 745,450 (16.1%)
- Nintendo 3DS – Down Year-on-Year 143,387 (-89.1%)
Sony
- PlayStation 4 – Down Year-on-Year 1,452,038 (-69.8%)
- PlayStation 5 – n/a
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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Switch will sell 28 million again this year
Probably. Or at least close.
It's ahead YoY after the two Animal Crossing weeks, so there's a chance that Switch will hit 30M this year, especially if new hardware will be released.
I think this is a where the switch starts losing a little ground compared to last year. Just until the end of May or so. The one two punch of lockdowns and animal crossing was huge.
Probably. But I'm imagining that around June a new hardware model will be announced. Also, their game lineup after Animal Crossing was pretty barebones with I think just Paper Mario, Xenoblade, and Hyrule Warriors. Pokemon Diamond remake alone should probably do more than those did to boost sales, and I'm hoping that Nintendo will have a better lineup this year considering how little they've been releasing lately.
I know everyone is excited about the new hardware, but I just don't see it happening this year. The chip shortages are a big obstacle. It's possible they already had this planned since 2019 to be released this year. But I kind of doubt that. Still thinking it's maybe going to be next year.
And even at that, I see a small revision happening with a dlss dock. Upgrade the usb-c port, new screen, maybe better battery life. But the performance in handheld mode will be pretty much identical to current models. It's the only way to keep developers from making exclusive games, which even nintendo was guilty of for the new 3ds.
I'm not an insider or anything. So I don't actually know. Just an educated guess based on patents and the available technology.
I don't really know much about the chip shortages, so maybe that could prevent it. I still think that it's likely happening. Based on some of the stuff that has been found in system update files, the rumors from fairly reputable sources, and Nintendo's questionable game output (which makes more sense if you think they're holding back software for some reason), I think it's likely to happen. Also, Nintendo's response to this question from investors back around January was it would not happen in the near future. We can assume they're being truthful, and they're wording definitely leaves open some possibilities. They could have said not this year for instance.
As for what a revision would do for sales, I don't know. I'm not seeing increased horsepower alone as a huge factor since you're right that whatever they do would have to be scalable to the handheld switch. But there could be some sort of hook unrelated to horsepower. A VR headset would be the most obvious potential hook, although it raises some potential fragmentation issues. But who knows. Detachable controllers aren't something I knew I wanted until they were shown, so maybe there's some other hardware feature up their sleeve.
I agree Nintendo is full of surprises. So they're hard to predict.
The sales just seem too good this year for a new model. Sony and Microsoft will likely be limited in supply for all of this year. It just doesn't seem like the switch needs much other than games this year. But it could go either way. I'm not completely ruling out the possibility of anything. I'm just leaning towards it being unlikely.
The fiscal year, maybe. I could see something happening around the 5th anniversary after the holidays. It would still be in time for the fiscal year, but after the holiday rush.
But my gut just says no about this year. Something just seems off about the rumors. I can't connect the dots the way the rumors are leading people to believe.
The chip shortages are so hard to predict for a Switch Pro. Right now, by far the biggest affected line is the TSMC 7-nm process. That is the one used the PS5, Xbox Series, ALL modern Radeon GPUs, ALL modern AMD CPUs, dozens upon dozens of smartphone processors, and numerous other tech. It just became so popular, not even because of the pandemic, but because of TSMC's execution and becoming ahead of any other foundry.
If you notice though, iPhone's are having no problem on TSMC's latest state-of-the-art 5-nm line, and that is because it is so new that it hardly has any costumers using it. If the Switch Pro was using that, I think it would be fine actually. Capacity seems to be holding strong, and will only continue to get better throughout the year.
But, I don't think it will. NVIDIA is split between Samsung and TSMC right now: TSMC 7-nm for their datacenter GPU based on Ampere, and Samsung 8-nm for all of their GeForce RTX 3000 series GPUs. Samsung's 8-nm line has few customers, but it also has FAR less capacity than TSMC, hence why the GeForce RTX graphics cards are impossible to find. Any Switch Pro chip would be one of those two options, and neither are looking great right now :/
Well they recently said they have all the chips they need for the year. So they either already have them for the pro or it's not happening this year.
Either that or it was just a lie to keep it a secret.
But regardless of what fabrication process, they would need to be made or have the order in already. The reason some companies have no issues is because they already had their orders in.
It depends on how one interprets what Nintendo said about having all of the chips. My guess? What they mean is that they have secured an order for "x" amount of chips from either TSMC or Samsung. BUT - and this is the problem - demand continues to be higher than everyone's expectations, and there is simply no way to meet that demand. What I mean is: Nintendo could have 5 million chips secured thru TSMC's 7-nm line for the Switch Pro. That is great! But if there is demand for say, 7-10 million Switch Pro's to sell, Nintendo can't go back to TSMC and increase their order. There just isn't any extra capacity to go around.
Nahh it won't
Well it was down this week already even with 750,000 units sold. I'm not trying to be negative. Last year it pretty much sold out around this time. It was even being scalped.
I'm not saying down for the year. I can't say for sure about that. I just think it will be down for the year within the next month or two. Maybe temporarily. Maybe not.
Agreed, unless there is another MH size release i'm forgetting about it should be down each week compared to last year until w/e May 15th with possible exception of w/e May 1st.
It has built up quite a gap though, so I think it should be able to ride out these "loss" weeks and still be ahead YOY (currently it's 745k ahead, gap should be less than 200k by the middle of May)
It is down compared to last hear same week whith the launch period of Animal Crossing, a game which had GTA V levels of sales, and still is up YoY overall
Don't forget that 2020 had many weeks with heavy shortages. There are a few weeks upcoming where Switch sold only 20k units in Japan because of supply issues. I don't think we will see that heavy shortages this year.
