PS5 vs Xbox Series X|S vs Switch Sales Comparison Charts Through August 14 - Sales
by William D'Angelo , posted on 26 August 2021 / 3,019 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 August 18)
2019 – (Week ending January 12 to August 17)
2020 – (Week ending January 11 to August 15)
2021 – (Week ending January 9 to August 14)
"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 1,485,502 (-71.1%)
- Xbox Series X|S – n/a
Nintendo
- Nintendo Switch - Down Year-on-Year 709,782 (-5.3%)
- Nintendo 3DS – Down Year-on-Year 302,041 (-90.6%)
Sony
- PlayStation 4 – Down Year-on-Year 4,297,031 (-71.5%)
- 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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Whether it recovers this -5.3% or not, Switch sales are fantastic in 2021.
It may somewhat, but it will probably fall a little short of last year. I would have thought closer to 28 million for the year, but it seems like 26-27 is what I would expect at this point. A decline until the OLED, a spike for the launch, and about on par for the holidays compared to last year.
Still doing well though.
Yes, I agree with you. I was hoping for a 2021 close or better than 2020, but I don't think the difference is recovered anymore. Although 2021 has been a very solid year, I think Nintendo has focused the console too much on the hardcore audience.The niche consumer has been over-supplied, while the more casual consumer hasn't had as many games to choose from. We'll have to see if the 4th gen Pokemon remakes can attract this part of the audience again.
I feel like the lines have been kind of blurred on switch more than previous consoles though.
The Mario and Zelda games always cross both audiences to some degree. Mario is more mainstream while Zelda is more enthusiast. But in both cases, I feel like they have picked up customers from the other camp.
You can extrapolate that out to a lot of the games like Splatoon or Luigi's mansion that have both made bigger splashes than previous installments.
I think Nintendo probably feels like the mainstream is being satisfied by a lot of the previously enthusiast franchises. And kind of vice versa. But the mainstream audience that doesn't have a switch still has the heavy hitters waiting for them (Mario kart 8, animal crossing, etc). The core audience, or as I say the video game enthusiasts, needs to have a more constant stream since they buy more games.
But I don't know what else they could put out to get the mainstream audience to buy a switch. Mario kart 9? New super Mario? Some sort of Wii sports? It just seems like they feel as though that audience is satiated already. I think price drops and the OLED are the solutions to growing the audience at this point rather than new releases. Especially if the standard switch gets eliminated and the OLED takes the 300 dollar slot around September/October of next year.
