Best selling game consoles

Features

February 23, 2014

No matter which industry you are in, the numbers are always important. Here are the top selling home consoles by manufacturer.

Sony

Since the PlayStation One released in 1994 the brand has been a cornerstone of console gaming. With 2 handhelds released with many revisions, and 4 home consoles (3 of them still selling today) it’s not much of a surprise to learn they have sold over 341.69 million home consoles combined.

Sony hasn’t been in the game for as long as Nintendo, but so far so good – even with the PS3 launch hiccups and overpriced hardware they survived and went on to release the PS4 which in just 4 months has sold 5.3 million.

Here are Sony’s top selling home consoles:

PlayStation 2 ( 2000 – 2013) 155 Million Units
PlayStation/ PSone (1994 – 2006) 102.49 Million Units
PlayStation 3 (2006 – Current) 80 Million Units
PlayStation 4 (2013 – Current) 5.3 Million Units

PlayStation 4 hero shot

Nintendo

Nintendo released their first home console in 1977 – the Color TV Game was an instant hit. It plugged directly into your TV and only had one game built into it.

Thus Nintendo was born, selling an average of 273.28 home consoles since 1977.

Here are Nintendo’s top selling home consoles:

Wii (2006 – 2013): 100.90 Million Units
Nintendo Entertainment System (1983 – 1995): 61.91 Million Units
Super Nintendo Entertainment System (1990 – 1999): 49.10 Million Units
Nintendo 64 ( 1996 – 2003): 32.93 Million Units
GameCube (2001 – 2007): 21.74 Million Units

Nintendo Color TV Game

Sega

SEGA once made home consoles, and really good ones. Some of the greatest games of all time were released on their systems and they went on to sell over 74 million consoles during their stint.

In 1999 SEGA announced that they were to shift their focus from hardware to software. In 2001 SEGA announced that they were to stop production of the Dreamcast and develop software for other platforms, a move that would decide the fate of the company.

By March 2002 SEGA had gone through five years of net loss and tried to merge with giants like Nintendo and the upcoming Xbox division – but that also failed. In 2005, Sammy Holding bought the controlling share from SEGA and formed one of the biggest gaming firms in the world, SEGA Sammy Holdings, now with 7,000 employees and worth $4.335 Billion.

SEGA now only makes games, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be remembered, selling 74.9 million units during their time in the industry. Here are SEGA’s top selling consoles of their time:

SEGA Genesis (1988 – 1997): 40 Million
SEGA Master System (1986 – 1989): 10 Million
SEGA Dreamcast (1998 – 2001 ): 10.6 Million
SEGA Saturn ( 1994 – 2000): 9.5 Million

SEGA Master System II

Microsoft

Releasing their first console in 2001, Microsoft had to compete with the PS2, SEGA Dreamcast, and the Nintendo GameCube.

One of the biggest selling points about the Xbox was the online gaming service that it offered; this service was subscription-based and was accessed by the built in Ethernet port on the console.

After the great success of the Xbox, Microsoft went on to create the Xbox 360 and with that Kinect was born, a motion tracking camera that allowed for a more immersive gaming experience.

Xbox One followed, resembling an “all-in-one” entertainment system. Microsoft has not been in the console industry as long as Sony and Nintendo, but things are going well for them, selling an average of 110.8 Million units across their previous and current consoles.

Here are the numbers: