The PS5 has dominated the European market share. It comfortably leads the console hardware sales for Europe in October followed by the Nintendo Switch. The struggles for market share continue for Xbox as sales continue to decrease.
The GSD (Game Sales Data), as reported by GamesIndustry.biz, has been published for the hardware and software sales for October. This data separately covers the hardware sales for the Eurozone and the UK markets. The data for Germany was not covered in the report.
The Eurozone Markets
A total of 481,000 consoles were sold across the tracked markets in the Eurozone. The PS5 comfortably took the first spot as the most-sold console across the tracked markets in Europe. Compared to October 2022, the PS5 sales are 143% higher, most likely due to the availability of stock this time around. Nintendo takes the second spot despite the 20% drop in sales compared to the same time last year. This can be correlated to the launch of the recent GOTY nominee, Super Mario Bros. Wonder. The bad news for Microsoft continue as the Xbox Series S/X consoles struggle with year-on-year sales being down by 52%. It would appear that despite the reported 136% increase in month-to-month sales, Starfield was unable to prevent Xbox sales from declining.
In month-to-month sales, the overall console hardware sales are up by almost 16% from September. The PS5 sales are 11% higher and the Switch sales are up by 10%. This is attributed to the release of Spider-Man 2 and Super Mario Bros Wonder in October. However, Xbox is the only current-gen console to experience a decrease in sales for the month. Xbox Series S/X sales are down by about 20% from the previous month. The decrease is expected as Starfield launched in September, increasing the number of sales for that specific month for some time.
For accessories and peripherals, there was a decrease of 3.6% in year-on-year sales with 1.14 million products sold in total across the tracked markets. Wallet and points card sales were also down by 4 % resulting in 969,818 units sold.
The UK Market
The console hardware sales in the UK were reported using the GfK figures. The console hardware experienced a slight drop of 10% month-to-month sales with about 176,002 devices being sold. Over the last 6 months, Sony’s PS5 had a 51% market share due to its strong sales over the summer. Xbox had its share drop to 23% while the Nintendo Switch declined a lot to 25%. Surprisingly, the PS5 and Xbox Series S/X suffered a decline in sales for October.
The PS5 sales dipped about 4%, despite the overall positive sales across the month. The EA Sports FC 24 bundle for the PS5 accounted for a whopping 56% of all the PS5 consoles sold in October. In contrast, the Spider-Man 2 PS5 bundle only accounted for 6% of all console sales.
Xbox Series S and X suffered a significant decline in sales of 33% in the UK. However, the strong sales in September due to Starfield make this decline in month-to-month sales expected. Despite the decline, the Xbox continues to stay ahead of the Nintendo Switch in terms of sales.
The Nintendo Switch remains in the third spot for console sales. However, the Switch had an increase in sales compared to the other two consoles. Switch sales rose by 15% from September’s figures, probably due to the launch of the Super Mario Bros Wonder. The new Mario red OLED version of the Switch, however, only accounted for 6.2% of the Switch sales in October.
Accessories for consoles experienced a decline of 15% in October compared to the same time last month. The white DualSense controller for the PS5 remained the No.1 accessory followed by the Carbon Black Xbox Wireless Controller.
Overall, it should be noted that anything can change when it comes to sales in the remaining months of the year. GfK’s Dorian Bloch has stated that the final three months of the year account for over half of all console sales during a calendar year. However, Microsoft would certainly be disappointed with the decline in numbers across Europe. It seems their hard-fought expensive acquisition of Activision-Blizzard has yet to reward them. Nintendo will remain unworried as they plan for their next iteration of the Nintendo Switch. For now, PlayStation continues to be the most popular console in Europe.
