Xbox Series X|S Become the Fastest-Selling Xbox Consoles Ever
Microsoft reported details from its fourth fiscal quarter this week and has confirmed that the [...]
Microsoft reported details from its fourth fiscal quarter this week and has confirmed that the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S consoles are now the company's fastest-selling consoles of all time. This means they've now beaten out the original Xbox, the Xbox 360, and the Xbox One for that top spot, a fact that probably won't be too surprising to those who've been struggling with the scarcity of the consoles when trying to find them in stock somewhere. Other details pertaining to Xbox Game Pass and some of Microsoft's other initiatives were also shared.
From the time the fourth quarter began to its end on June 30th, Microsoft said (via GamesIndustry.biz) that the division in which Xbox is included jumped up by 9% in revenue to $14.1 billion. Gaming revenue, specifically, increased by 11% to arrive at $357 million. Revenue earned from gaming hardware increased by 172% in the fourth quarter with more Xbox consoles being sold then compared to when the availability of the consoles previously.
We estimate that the Xbox Series X|S total sell in was 6.5m as of June 30, 2021.
Compared to our estimate of 5.7m for Xbox One and 5.0m for Xbox 360 in the same timeframe.
Supply for Series X|S improved in the past quarter, with hardware revenue up 20% QoQ. https://t.co/ypHqyTqZzo
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) July 27, 2021
While Microsoft shared revenue details, it did not, however, provide information about just how many Xbox Series X|S consoles had been sold. We do have estimates for that though such as the one above from Niko Partners senior analyst Daniel Ahmad. He said it was estimated that the Xbox Series X|S sales totaled 6.5 million as of June 30th when the quarter ended. This estimate would outstrip the Xbox One by nearly a million consoles with the gap between the newer hardware and the Xbox 360 being even bigger.
As for the content available on those consoles, the figures were both up and down depending on where you looked. The subdivision of Xbox pertaining to content and services featured a decline of 4% last quarter which was attributed to "a decline in third-party titles on a strong prior year comparable that benefitted from stay-at-home scenarios." Microsoft's big Xbox Game Pass push appears to have made a difference though with the number of subscriptions to that service increasing.
Numbers for the PlayStation 5 console were also released this week with Sony confirming another milestone for how many consoles it's sold so far. Similar to the new Xbox consoles, the PlayStation 5 was also declared to be the fastest-selling PlayStation console in history.