Like the worst sort of father, Xbox doesn’t show much care for its youngest consoles anymore, at least judging solely by recent sales data. Black Friday weekend, normally one of the most important for any brand for pre-holiday sales, shows Xbox got beat out by Nintendo, Sony, and—to give the news an ounce of irony—even a relatively obscure Kinect-like console.
Mat Piscatella, a video game industry analyst at Circana, reported that the PlayStation 5 accounted for 47% of total Black Friday week console sales, in the U.S. ending Nov. 29. That makes sense, considering the console was on sale for about 40% at some retailers. Sony’s console—both the digital version and one with a disc drive—was on sale for less than even its pre-hike price. Meanwhile, coming up second was the Nintendo Switch 2 at 24% of total sales. The second-generation handheld console was on sale for $50 off the normally $500 Mario Kart World bundle from Walmart and Amazon. Finally, coming in third was the NEX Playground at 14%.
What’s the NEX Playground, you may ask? It’s an Android-based platform made for younger children. It includes motion sensors that can read body movements for games such as Fruit Ninja or tie-in titles like How to Train Your Dragon: Riders of the Skies. Yes, that’s very much like the long-defunct Kinect. It’s a very specific kind of console that may make sense for budget-conscious families. What’s missing from this pie chart is the Xbox Series S and Series X.
Xbox would rather you buy a Game Pass subscription than one of its much more expensive consoles. © Adriano Contreras / Gizmodo
Microsoft pushed no sales for its consoles during Black Friday week. Even if some retailers went out of their way to move stock with extra gift cards or game sales, Xbox itself wasn’t helping push the needle. The current Xbox Series X costs $650 after this year’s latest price hike. The same console cost $500 at launch in 2020. Piscatella wrote on Bluesky, “Stuff that does not price promote (generally speaking, here) does not see much of a seasonal lift at all from the prior week (usually none).” Since the PS5 was the most heavily discounted, it received the lion’s share of additional sales. Xbox either did not think it was necessary to push sales, or the brand just doesn’t care anymore.
Xbox’s whole strategy is now focused on software. If it does finally release a next-gen Xbox, it will likely be a premium, expensive gaming device made for players who want the very best. That means the Xbox Series consoles don’t really have a place anymore. There have been signs that Xbox has been shipping far fewer consoles to retailers, such that Costco removed the company’s consoles from its U.S. and UK websites.
The move toward a software-based gaming ecosystem is inevitably disappointing for Xbox fans. At the same time, the cost of RAM and SSD memory blew past the point of reason several weeks ago, and it keeps getting worse. Burgeoning AI data centers are willing to pay so much for memory that semiconductor companies have created a drought of consumer-ready DRAM (dynamic random access memory). The reliable leaker Moore’s Law is Dead reported Sony stockpiled enough memory for the short term, but the RAM shortage could last through 2028. Yes, RAM prices could still be out of control a few years from now.
Meanwhile, Xbox’s cloud gaming service has reportedly seen an uptick in total usage hours lately. Whether that means there are more people buying into Game Pass is another question entirely. Microsoft hasn’t been willing to share total subscriber numbers recently. There’s a chance Microsoft’s strategy will win out over the traditionalists like Sony and Nintendo. But for now, its console business is bleeding out so fast, it likely won’t last long.
And things aren’t going to get easier for Xbox. Valve is launching its Steam Machine in early 2026 and there will no doubt be all kinds of third-party console-sized PCs of the same ilk. When the next-gen Xbox does arrive, it won’t be a battle directly with Sony’s “PS6.” The console wars will have changed by then, with more players fighting for the living room than ever before.
