PS5 Sells 3.55M, NS and XS Sales Drop - Worldwide Hardware Estimates for November 2023 - Sales
by William D'Angelo , posted on 02 January 2024 / 22,678 Views
The PlayStation 5 was the best-selling console worldwide with 3,545,869 units sold for November 2023, according to VGChartz estimates. The PlayStation 5 has now sold an estimated 48.93 million units lifetime worldwide.
The Nintendo Switch sold an estimated 1,667,465 units to bring its lifetime sales to 132.91 million units. The Xbox Series X|S sold 1,031,210 units to bring their lifetime sales to 25.37 million units. The PlayStation 4 sold an estimated 17,299 units to bring its lifetime sales to 117.17 million units.
PS5 sales compared to the same month for the PS4 in 2016 are up by nearly 322,000 units, while the Xbox Series X|S compared to the same month for the Xbox One are down by nearly 730,000 units. PS4 sold 3,224,010 units for the month of November 2016 and Xbox One sales were at 1,760,878 units.
PlayStation 5 sales compared to the same month a year ago are up by 1,130,586 (46.8%). Xbox Series X|S sales are down by 189,182 units (-15.5%) and Nintendo Switch sales are down by 1,164,741 units (-41.1%). The PlayStation 4 is down by 14,398 units (-45.4%) year-over-year.
Looking at sales month-on-month, PlayStation 5 sales are up by over 2.31 million units, Xbox Series X|S sales are up by over 619,000 units, and Nintendo Switch sales are up by nearly 799,000 units. It should be noted there are four weeks in October, while there were five weeks in September. It should be noted November included Black Friday, but not Cyber Monday.
2023 year-to-date, the PlayStation 5 has sold an estimated 17.92 million units, the Nintendo Switch has sold 12.55 million units, and the Xbox Series X|S has sold 5.64 million units.
Check out the breakdown of the Americas sales here, the Europe sales here, and the Japan sales here.
Monthly Sales:
Global hardware estimates for November 2023 (Followed by lifetime sales):
- PlayStation 5 - 3,545,869 (48,932,444)
- Switch - 1,667,465 (132,912,906)
- Xbox Series X|S - 1,031,210 (25,373,618)
- PlayStation 4 - 17,299 (117,169,298)
- PlayStation 5 - 1,220,787
- Xbox Series X|S - 686,787
- Switch - 681,481
- PlayStation 4 - 5,852
- PlayStation 5 - 1,710,324
- Switch - 521,626
- Xbox Series X|S - 245,131
- PlayStation 4 - 3,398
- PlayStation 5 - 520,037
- Switch - 407,316
- Xbox Series X|S - 41,432
- PlayStation 4 - 7,570
- PlayStation 5 - 94,721
- Xbox Series X|S - 57,860
- Switch - 57,042
- PlayStation 4 - 479
Weekly Sales:
Global November 4, 2023 hardware estimates:
- PlayStation 5 - 468,334
- Switch - 287,156
- Xbox Series X|S - 125,859
- PlayStation 4 - 3,867
Global November 11, 2023 hardware estimates:
- PlayStation 5 - 827,689
- Switch - 283,817
- Xbox Series X|S - 182,934
- PlayStation 4 - 4,138
Global November 18, 2023 hardware estimates:
- PlayStation 5 - 777,254
- Switch - 301,536
- Xbox Series X|S - 175,691
- PlayStation 4 - 3,231
Global November 25, 2023 hardware estimates:
- PlayStation 5 - 1,472,592
- Switch - 794,956
- Xbox Series X|S - 546,726
- PlayStation 4 - 6,063
VGChartz Methodology: Hardware estimates are based on retail sampling and trends in individual countries, which are then extrapolated to represent the wider region. This typically allows us to produce figures that end up being within 10% of the actual totals.
This data is regularly compared against official shipment figures released by the console manufacturers and figures estimated by regional trackers with greater market coverage than ourselves. We then update our own estimates to bring them into line with those figures. This can result in frequent changes often within a short space of time, but we feel it's important to prioritise accuracy over consistency.
Note that our estimates are based on sell-through data (units sold to consumers). In almost all cases the figures released by console manufacturers are based on shipment data (sell-in), where as soon as a device has left the factory and entered the supply chain for delivery it is considered a sale. This is why there is always a difference between the companies’ figures (sell-in) and VGChartz estimates (sell-through), even after we’ve made adjustments. The one exception to that is when a console has been discontinued and the remaining stock has finally sold out – at that point the figures will match.
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 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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A shockingly bad result for Xbox. To sell just 1.03m when the Xbox One sold 1.76m in Nov 2016 is just crazy.
Lets see if the aggressive pricing in December helps Xbox or not. MS has officially dropped the price of the Series X to $399 until December 24 and some retailers have had it as low as $350.
I feel like for MS to stop the dropping in sales YoY they need to permanently drop the price of the Series X to $399, the 512GB Series S to $250 and the 1TB Series S to $300.
it fell behind sometime in the summer
Stay ahead? It's already behind by a good amount.
You raise a good point because when the sale ends, so do Xbox sales. The problem is 2 fold. Sure they could just make the price cut perm but they had to drop the S to $150 and throw in a headset just to move it in some places. Even worse, Microsoft has to absorb at leat $100 in loses every time it sells an Xbox at the fire sale prices. If their goal is to push 80 million GP subs by 2027 with Xbox as it's main vehicle of sales, the whole endeavor is pointless. They have to find some way to get GP on PlayStation and Nintendo because Xbox is now a liability.
Don't need the system to play those games
PS5 3.5 times xseries
PS5 will possibly go 2:1 Lifetime over Xbox Series X/S next month
No, for sure it will.
PS5 is still king
Amazing month for the PS5. Switch is reaching saturation with how much it has sold. And Xbox Series X|S well not a great month being down year-on-year for 2 straight Novembers.
Xbox Series X|S has outsold the original Xbox this month. That article will be up later today or tomorrow.
PS5 will be topping the SNES in December.
Part of it is saturation, sure, but a huge part of it is that no one does proper price drops anymore. Think if Switch, the regular Switch, was $199, and the Switch Lite was like $129? That used to a normal thing back in the PS1/PS2/PS3 days. PS3 went from $599 to $199 over the course of its lifetime, for example. PS4 and Xbox One got essentially one price reduction only their whole lifetime, from $399 to $299, and even that was really just to make room for PS4 Pro and Xbox One X.
Yeah a price drop would help sales, but console makers are more concerned about profits right now rather than trying to sell more consoles and eat into profits.
except they get more long term profits locking people into their ecosystems and subbing to them especially if they're still making a profit on the hardware even at $50 less
I agree they do get more benefits and profit from games, and subscriptions. Didn't the Xbox Series, and the PS5 sell at a loss originally?
Switch has never been sold at a loss because the demand was always there.
PS5 was sold at a loss of profit in their first 1 or 2 years of selling.
Xbox Series is always selling at a loss of profit.
Right now:
PS5 increased their prices due to an increase in demand and not enough supply.
Xbox decreased their prices due to a decrease in demand and too much supply.
Nintendo is decreasing prices slightly (for the holiday most likely) due to a decrease in demand and too much supply.
As best as I know, since PS4/Xbox One, they have all been sold at profit or break even:
PS4 @ $399 - break even or small profit
Xbox One (with Kinect) @ $499 - small profit
Xbox One (no Kinect) @ $399 - break even or small profit
P55 Disc Model @ $499 - break even or small profit
Xbox Series X @ $499 - break even
Xbox Series S @ $299 - break even
PS5 Digital Model @ $399 - small loss (after all, only diff was a Blu-ray Drive that probably was less than $20 to Sony to include), however, that should easily be made up by even a couple full price ($70) game buys digitally
I don't know about PS4 or Xbox One. So I can't agree nor disagree so I will take that at face value.
But, Xbox Series X/S: Phil Spencer reported at the WSJ Tech Live on Oct 26 2022, that they subsidize the purchase of a consoles and lose anywhere between $100-$200 per console purchase. And they most likely still are considering it is being sold for it's cheapest price ever.
On Aug 4 2021, Hiroki Totoki, Sony's chief financial officer, stated that the PS5 (with disc drive) is no longer sold at a loss. Most articles state that the PS5 costs $450 to make, losing about -$60, and in fact PS3 & PS4 initially sold at a loss in profit. But since Aug 2021 they have been selling PS5 at a gain in profit.
Nintendo makes about $40 for every Switch sold and $80 for every OLED sold.
Sorry about the Series X info, as I guess I definitely had that wrong. I was going off memory from financial results and the investor calls afterwards. That is usually the best/only place for this info. Sony & MS have to be truthful when answering those questions at earnings reports calls, otherwise they would get in trouble for deceiving investors. I just recall both Sony and MS saying, shortly (within 6 months or so) after the PS4 and Xbox One launches things like they are being sold at cost or making a small profite. Small profit could be as little as a $1 though haha. They were asked this all the time at earnings results because of the PS3/X360 gen, where both of those were sold at loss almost their whole lifetime (PS3 being the worst of the two of course). I think I recall for PS3, at the beginning, that it needed at least 10 full game sales per console sale to make profit at that point. Which, some people might just buy Madden 07 and never buy a game again, so it was a definitely a gamble on Sony's end.
That's totally fine, honestly I don't recall anything about the PS4 or Xbox One profits (or deficits), same about PS3 and X360. I do trust your comment regarding their prices and whether or not they made small profits or broke even.
Hahaha, i like the remark about $1, but hey profit is profit. :)
And yes I agree that it is a huge gamble for a console company to sell their product at a loss. And yep there might be some people that only buy one game. In that sense, then yes Playstation (in the scenario you provided with Madden 07) would be losing money, but many other people usually buy more than one game, so I guess that's where profit comes from.
Either way it is a gamble.
Usually with Sony and Microsoft is that they usually sell at a loss at the beginning of a console's life and as time goes on the cost to make the parts for the console go down making the console profit increase until it is a profit to sell.
Nintendo likes to put the console at a price where they gain profit at the start, that way they won't need to increase prices, or decrease prices because its at an affordable cost and people buy it.
Really impressive for PS5.
Switch still going strong
PS5 - 55M lifetime by year's end.
Is November in general usually the weaker selling of the two months?
It is, that's why I think PS5 will make at least 6M in December
If PS5 Slim get price cut just like PS4 Slim it could easily exceed 4 millions.
Yup. Séries S/X is dying, early next gen rumors likely true.
This will be more linked to ai tech, over the sales, as all games sales ( as per ms own reports, with hardware the only thing down) are up, thanks to pc and so on
Dont see the point of an early next gen, they gonna get sandwich between people not wanting to leave their library behind on PS5 and NS, the NS2, the PS5 pro and a most likely a crazy 1st party software line up for the last few years of PS5. Not a good time to launch early.
There are many problems with this strategy, perhaps they have no choice given the sales of Series S/X.
Bold move if true, but I believe the chances of success are small.
Still wondering if PS5 can reach it's 25M goal
It wasn’t overshipped, it was starting from a stock position of almost zero, so it had to ship about 2m additional units just to get inventory levels up to the proper amounts.
Switch down by a whopping 41% ? That's cliff right there.
I wish Switch had been selling more these last couple of weeks. I hope it can recover for this situation a little in December. It have been having a great year so far, especially if we consider how old this console is
Switch is still fighting but guys, it sold 133millions lol
yes it has and is a brilliant success but this is about November 2023 sales
Yes but it is still obtaining these numbers.👀
I'm sure the people who posted already knew that.
Yes, then? I just wrote a comment.😅
Just seen a tweet that the UK is getting a price cut on Series X|S. Not sure it will make much difference for December seeing as most who wanted to buy a console as a gift already got one earlier in the month from Black Friday or Cyber Monday deals.
Best of luck to XB for trying but it may be too little too late. https://www.purexbox.com/news/2023/12/its-the-uks-turn-xbox-series-x-reduced-by-over-p100-for-christmas-2023
These are the same prices as over Black Friday week, except the Series S was actually £180 at one point,
MS & Xbox lost it a long time ago when they forgot that a steady stream of great games is what drives Console Sales!!!
