By Sagar V. Mankar The gaming industry experienced some interesting shifts this September, with overall content sales showing a slight decline while certain segments displayed remarkable resilience. According to Mat Piscatella’s latest Circana report, content sales reached $3.91 billion, marking a 3% decrease compared to September 2023.
Perhaps the most striking development was in the hardware sector, where sales hit their lowest point since September 2019. The total hardware revenue amounted to just $251 million, representing a steep 44% decline. Among gaming consoles, the Xbox Series S|X felt the heaviest impact with a 54% year-over-year decrease, while PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch saw drops of 45% and 23% respectively.
Despite these, PlayStation 5 maintained its market leadership in both units sold and revenue generated. Interestingly PS5’s digital version made up 40% of all PS5 sales and contributed to 18% of total U.S. gaming hardware sales. The PlayStation Portal, a streaming device, also showed promising adoption rates with 3% of PS5 owners in the U.S. already owning the device.
Looking at the broader picture, 2024’s first nine months have been surprisingly competitive with 2023. The total revenue reached $40.671 billion, nearly matching last year’s $40.587 billion. This resilience can be partly attributed to the strong performance in mobile gaming, which saw an impressive $1.7 billion increase compared to 2023. However, console game sales experienced a decline of $0.8 billion during the same period.
In the software domain, EA Sports FC 25 made history by achieving the highest launch revenue ever recorded for a football game in the U.S. market. Other major releases in September included Astro Bot, The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, NBA 2K25, NHL 25, Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics, and Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine II. Notably, Black Myth: Wukong was excluded from the list because its developers do not share sales data with Circana.
The year’s top performers so far include EA Sports College Football 25, Helldivers II, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, with EA Sports FC 25 already securing a spot in the top 10 despite its recent release (which is September 27).
On the mobile front, the top games by revenue are MONOPOLY GO!, Royal Match, and Roblox. Brawl Stars also saw a significant 64% revenue increase, thanks to a collaboration with SpongeBob SquarePants.
The accessories market provided a rare bright spot, showing a modest 1% growth and reaching $217 million, with the PlayStation Portal emerging as the segment’s revenue leader.