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Skyrocketing Sony PlayStation 5 sales give the console its best quarter yet

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What just happened? Sony’s PlayStation 5 has just experienced its best quarter since launching in November 2020. Consumers bought 7.1 million consoles in the three months ending December 31, 2022, marking an 83% uplift compared to the same period a year earlier.

The latest PS5 sales figures in Sony’s third-quarter FY2022 financial results mean the PlayStation 5 has now sold 32 million units since release, placing it above the Sega Genesis and just below the Nintendo 64 on the list of best-selling consoles of all time. That’s especially impressive considering the issues that the industry has had to deal with over the last few years; the PlayStation 4 had shipped just under 38 million units by this point in its lifecycle.

The PS5 still has a long way to go before catching Sony’s next best-selling games machine, the PlayStation Portable (80-82 million). The PlayStation 2, meanwhile, tops the best-selling consoles list with over 155 million lifetime sales.

The PlayStation 5 was one of the most difficult products to find following its launch over two years ago—unless you were willing to pay scalpers two or three (or more) times the MSRP. The huge demand and chip crisis meant buying a PS5 often required a lot of luck, patience, and money.

But the PS5 supply situation has been improving. The 12.8 million units sold during the first three quarters of financial year 2022 marks a 34% YoY increase and the PlayStation 5’s best performance to date.

Sony said twice this month that it has increased the supply of PlayStation 5 consoles, and that buying one should be a lot easier from now on. That confidence is reflected in the company’s outlook for the final quarter: it has raised the annual PS5 sales target from 18 million to 19 million, so it expects to move another 6.2 million consoles before March 31.

Video game sales also increased during FY22Q3, up from 62.5 million in the previous quarter to 86.5 million. That’s down from the 92.7 million sold during the same three month period a year earlier, but Sony will still be happy, especially as 20.8 million of those games were first-party titles—at least 11 million were God of War Ragnarök. Digital downloads continue to make up most game sales, though their 62% share remains unchanged from last year.

PlayStation Plus subscribers also went up, from 45.5 million to 46.6 million; monthly active users grew 10 million to 112 million; and the service’s revenue has improved, likely a result of the more expensive tier’s introduction.

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