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[jm89]

£167 million worth of video game consoles, accessories and physical games were sold over the Black Friday week in the UK, GfK reveals.
It's the third biggest Black Friday for video games so far. It's only beaten by Black Friday 2013 and Black Friday 2020, which both coincided with the launch of a PlayStation console (PS4 in 2013 and PS5 in 2020).

The UK physical video games market saw a revenue jump of 22% compared with last year's event. 47% of that revenue came from console sales, whereas just 40% of Black Friday 2022 revenue came from console hardware.
In terms of where customers bought these products, 82% of Black Friday video game sales were via online retailers, which matches 2022's number. In 2020, online share was 88% due to the second COVID-19 lockdown that occurred around the same time.

In terms of consoles, hardware sales were up 34% over Black Friday 2022, and this was driven by the Playstation 5. PS5 was in limited supply in 2022, and as a result PS5's Black Friday performance is 217% up compared with the year before.
It was the second biggest sales week for Switch, PS5 and Xbox Series S and X sales since all three consoles were on the market. The previous biggest was the launch week of PS5, which was also Black Friday and the second week of Xbox Series S and X.
PlayStation may grab the headlines, but it was still a strong week for Xbox Series S and X, which managed to match its Black Friday performance from last year. Overall, Black Friday 2023 was the third biggest week yet for Xbox Series S and X console sales.

Over in accessories, and it was the biggest Black Friday yet for peripherals sales, GfK reveals. This was driven by strong sales of VR headsets, joypads and gaming headsets.
"VR was in the spotlight over Black Friday 2023 and this was the biggest ever revenue week for VR" says GfK games boss Dorian Bloch.

"Gaming Headsets show a similar picture to joypads, with a reverse on units and slight revenue increase," Bloch concludes. "For headsets, the under £60 category grew 5% points to 45% of overall revenue and this segment actually saw an average selling price increase from £25 to £29. At the same time the over £100 category took 26% of revenue in both time periods, but the average selling price grew from £139 to £156, which confirms a trend that has been happening for a long time – namely that the premium end of the market is highly prized by consumers, willing to trade upwards to higher priced SKUs."

Huge console sales deliver record Black Friday for UK games retail

£167 million worth of video game consoles, accessories and physical games were sold over the Black Friday week in the U…

www.gamesindustry.biz

 

[Unknown?]

Impressive!

 

[onQ123]

Ok but we need more data

Edit: my comment was made when there was only 1 tweet in the OP lol

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

The UK physical video games market saw a revenue jump of 22% compared with last year's event.

Say no more fam!

 

[Mowcno]

PS5 up by 217% YoY. Xbox just "matched" last year despite heavy discounts.

 

[Ronin_7]

PS5 up by 217% YoY. Xbox just "matched" last year despite heavy discounts.

Install base lads: Xbox will win UK Black Friday week

 

[Dr.brain64]

Crazy!

 

[Three]

This was driven by strong sales of VR headsets, joypads and gaming headsets.
"VR was in the spotlight over Black Friday 2023 and this was the biggest ever revenue week for VR" says GfK games boss Dorian Bloch.

Nice!

 

[Horseganador]

PS5 = +217%
XBS = 0%

So PS5 tripled its sales... and Xbox, despite the discounts, only managed to stay the same as last year.

 

[Heisenberg007]

PS5 up by 217% YoY. Xbox just "matched" last year despite heavy discounts.

I noticed that too. If Xbox "matched" last year, then it wasn't clearly the "3rd biggest BF sale ever" by any meaningful margin.

 

[Heisenberg007]

Nice!

Too bad we didn't get the split between Quest 3 and PSVR 2. I reckon, most of these sales would be Quest 3.

Whether it is PSVR 2 or Quest 3, though, I'm always cheering for more VR sales and support!

 

[ChuckeRearmed]

Surprisingly good result for Xbox. Considering that last year there was a shortage of PS consoles, the fact that the Xbox sold the same amount as the last year, despite PS being available proves once again my suspicion that if Xbox cost less than 499$ and 299$, people would buy it more. When Xbox has the same price as Playstation, consumers prefer buying Playstation.

 

[jm89]

Can't see the xbox console sales being that great

They had heavy discounts and their biggest year for games but stil the same as last year..

 

[BrunoCoel]

Install base lads: Xbox will win UK Black Friday week

They really said that? lmao

I know that that forum is full of former playstation haters from REEEE but omg

 

[mckmas8808]

VR is back BABY!

 

[Flutta]

Didn’t Xbox win BF this year? Or did i miss something?

 

[yazenov]

Last Year Xbox was supposedly low in stock and had no big hitters like Starfielfd.

This year, abundant stock, discounts, and games of the generation Starfield, High-Fi Rush, and Forza.

Yet it still fell flat in sales, while PS5 went to the moon.

 

[Ozriel]

PS5 up by 217% YoY. Xbox just "matched" last year despite heavy discounts.

PS5 = +217%
XBS = 0%

So PS5 tripled its sales... and Xbox, despite the discounts, only managed to stay the same as last year.

As the article says, the PS5 was heavily supply limited last year.

In fact, last BF week, the console share was

Switch - 42% of all consoles sold
Xbox Series - 40% of all consoles sold
PS5 - 18%

Source

The growth % this year is impressive…but that’s from a low start point.

 

[chonga]

Yes but how long did the users spend browsing the product pages? Unless we are given that Engagement Time in the sales process this data is pointless.

 

[mckmas8808]

PS5 = +217%
XBS = 0%

So PS5 tripled its sales... and Xbox, despite the discounts, only managed to stay the same as last year.

Starfield was supposed to increase sales. This can't be good for MS.

Too bad we didn't get the split between Quest 3 and PSVR 2. I reckon, most of these sales would be Quest 3.

Whether it is PSVR 2 or Quest 3, though, I'm always cheering for more VR sales and support!

I swear I wish we had a break down of these headsets.

Surprisingly good result for Xbox. Considering that last year there was a shortage of PS consoles, the fact that the Xbox sold the same amount as the last year, despite PS being available proves once again my suspicion that if Xbox cost less than 499$ and 299$, people would buy it more. When Xbox has the same price as Playstation, consumers prefer buying Playstation.

We don't know what the sales were last year though. The PS shortages mean nothing if the PS5 sold more than Xbox last BF. We need last year's numbers first to determine how good or bad this is for Xbox.

 

[Zones]

PS5 = +217%
XBS = 0%

So PS5 tripled its sales... and Xbox, despite the discounts, only managed to stay the same as last year.

Here's the tale of Chris Dring in a nutshell...

 

[Elios83]

PS5 BF week wasn't even particularly strong in the UK although massively up yoy because they had massive sales the week before and the week after there was the official launch of the Slim.

In summary: the full November data will be crazy for PS5.

Edit with estimates:
For BF week:
PS5 83K
XB S/X 56K

Full month:
PS5 250k
XB S/X 100-120k

 

[jm89]

In summary: the full November data will be crazy for PS5.

I think so aswell.

The lead up to black friday alot of retailers actually where running low on ps5s this year.

The reason being the discount on the phat models where running much earlier then black friday so they where selling out much earlier, and the slim release date was after black friday weekend.

The impact of the discounts would have been felt much earlier in the month, whilst the impact of the slim right at the end of the month(after black friday).

 

[DForce]

Surprisingly good result for Xbox. Considering that last year there was a shortage of PS consoles, the fact that the Xbox sold the same amount as the last year, despite PS being available proves once again my suspicion that if Xbox cost less than 499$ and 299$, people would buy it more. When Xbox has the same price as Playstation, consumers prefer buying Playstation.

Xbox had discounts throughout the year and still lost.

So your suspicion is incorrect.

 

[mckmas8808]

As the article says, the PS5 was heavily supply limited last year.

In fact, last BF week, the console share was

Switch - 42% of all consoles sold
Xbox Series - 40% of all consoles sold
PS5 - 18%

Source

The growth % this year is impressive…but that’s from a low start point.

Thanks for the context. This is good to know.

 

[mckmas8808]

This is what Chris wrote last year for VR.

Over in accessories, VR was once again a star performer, driven by the Meta Quest 2 with Resident Evil 4 bundle. Last week was the all-time No.1 for VR revenue in the UK, and No.5 in terms of unit sales.

I wish he would have done that this year too. I wonder why he didn't.

 

[ChuckeRearmed]

We don't know what the sales were last year though

But we can estimate no? PS numbers from the last year should be available.

Xbox had discounts throughout the year and still lost.

So your suspicion is incorrect.

Except Xbox did not have that many discounts at all. Playstation was supply constrained last year. And - newsflash - during Black Friday - Playstation also was pushing the discounts.

And if we use these numbers

As the article says, the PS5 was heavily supply limited last year.

In fact, last BF week, the console share was

Switch - 42% of all consoles sold
Xbox Series - 40% of all consoles sold
PS5 - 18%

Source

The growth % this year is impressive…but that’s from a low start point.

It literally tells us that Xbox sales are relatively consistent, but just Playstation is much more popular among the consumers. Last month (was that last month?) the sales of Xbox decline YoY but that did not decline during the BF week, despite Playstation selling at discount - so it means that if Xbox cost less than 499$, even with PS being widely available and at discount - sales stay consistent.

 

[Heisenberg007]

Surprisingly good result for Xbox.

How?

2022 was arguably the worst recent year for Xbox. And yet they sold the same number of units in 2023 as 2022, despite having Starfield + Forza + $150 off in discounts. Nothing moved the needle for them.

 

[Darkkahn]

But spoderman didn't win an award!

 

[Ozriel]

How?

2022 was arguably the worst recent year for Xbox. And yet they sold the same number of units in 2023 as 2022, despite having Starfield + Forza + $150 off in discounts. Nothing moved the needle for them.

Same website says they sold pretty well last Black Friday, though.

Nintendo Switch was the best-selling games console during UK Black Friday

Nintendo Switch is top selling games console over Black Friday

www.gamesindustry.biz

 

[Dr.D00p]

Those £300 cost of living payments see the light of day...

 

[Luminoth-4545]

With the percentages this is what i have for BF week

Black Friday UK 2022

Switch : 61.000 units
Xbox Series: 58.000 units
PS5: 26.000 units

Total: 145.000 units

Black Friday UK 2023

PS5: 82.500 units (+217%)
Xbox Series: 58.000 units (flat)
Switch: 54.000 units (-11%)

Total: 194.500 units (+34%)

 

[kazuyamishima]

Great numbers for PS5, seems that pre BF week was a big one too.

 

[Ar¢tos]

Starfield was supposed to increase sales. This can't be good for MS.

I was told here that Starfield would make Xboxes fly off the shelves.
Posts like this one didn't age very well:

Yeah anyone's deluding themselves if they think Starfield will be anything less than massive. Game will sell tons of Xbox hardware and Game Pass subscriptions and sell millions on PC as well.

 

[jm89]

Those £300 cost of living payments see the light of day...

Folks are saving that when we get hosed in january with energy price increases.

 

[jroc74]

Didn’t Xbox win BF this year? Or did i miss something?

Beat me to it, lol.

That thread was.....interesting.

 

[DForce]

But we can estimate no? PS numbers from the last year should be available.


Except Xbox did not have that many discounts at all. Playstation was supply constrained last year. And - newsflash - during Black Friday - Playstation also was pushing the discounts.

February
239.99 at the Microsoft store.

Xbox Series S price slashed at Microsoft Store for the first time this year

Microsoft's all-digital console has dropped by $60 to $239.99

www.gamesradar.com

March
$150 off at the Verizon store.

Xbox Series S is down to $150 — if you’re a Verizon customer

This killer deal is available to wireless subscribers

www.polygon.com

The site makes an important note:

It’s common to find the Xbox Series S selling for around $230,

July
Xbox Series S under $199.99

Xbox Series S Is for Sale for Under $200

Amazon has slashed the price of the Xbox Series S gaming console to a new low of $199.99 for a limited time during today's Prime Day sale.

gamerant.com

August


At target with several free NEW games.


September
Xbox Series X - $450 off.

https://www.engadget.com/the-xbox-series-x-is-back-down-to-450-154534111.htm

This is only the US, there were heavy discounts in Europe.

 

[Mowcno]

Just as a reminder, this year Xbox Series S was sold from £184 for BF

Grab a new Xbox Series S console from Currys for under £190 this Black Friday weekend

Save £60 and get a brand new Xbox Series S console from Amazon during this Black Friday sale, available for under £190 right now.

www.eurogamer.net

The Series X was discounted to £359. £120 below RRP.

Black Friday Xbox deals 2023: best offers and discounts

Here's the best Black Friday 2023 Xbox deals you can score today including Xbox Series X and S consoles, games and all …

www.eurogamer.net

Hugely discounted, unlike 2022, and following Starfield+Forza releases and yet sales are not up compared to 2022. Come the new year when the promotions are over Xbox hardware will be flat as a pancake.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

Mibu no ookami Sony is going to hit their 25M target, no doubt whatsoever

 

[MrA]

PS5 = +217%
XBS = 0%

So PS5 tripled its sales... and Xbox, despite the discounts, only managed to stay the same as last year.

ah but the switch is down slightly, usually its down more than the switch, huge win right there, better than being the actually most sold console

 

[mckmas8808]

With the percentages this is what i have for BF week

Black Friday UK 2022

Switch : 61.000 units
Xbox Series: 58.000 units
PS5 : 26.000 units

Total: 145.000 units

A 34% increase in units would mean a total of 194.500

Black Friday UK 2023

PS5: 82.500 units (+217%)
Xbox Series: 58.000 units (flat)
Switch: 54.000 units (-11%)

Total: 194.500 units (+34%)

A 59% to 41% split is actually better for Xbox than previous months in the UK.

 

[Mr.Phoenix]

Mibu no ookami Sony is going to hit their 25M target, no doubt whatsoever

Amen, brother... amen.

Only putting this in prayer because I made the same prediction.

 

[pasterpl]

With the percentages this is what i have for BF week

Black Friday UK 2022

Switch : 61.000 units
Xbox Series: 58.000 units
PS5 : 26.000 units

Total: 145.000 units

A 34% increase in units would mean a total of 194.500

Black Friday UK 2023

PS5: 82.500 units (+217%)
Xbox Series: 58.000 units (flat)
Switch: 54.000 units (-11%)

Total: 194.500 units (+34%)

Thanks for the data. Wondering if it includes ps5 slim pre-orders (new hardware launch hype). Spiderman 2 recent release and some discounts eg. £200 off ps5 when you buy Sony tv probably helped with sales. Xbox staying flat with so much Sony activity around Black Friday dates is quite good result.

 

[Mr Moose]

A 59% to 41% split is actually better for Xbox than previous months in the UK.

Black Friday is one week of sales.

Thanks for the data. Wondering if it includes ps5 slim pre-orders (new hardware launch hype). Spiderman 2 recent release and some discounts eg. £200 off ps5 when you buy Sony tv probably helped with sales. Xbox staying flat with so much Sony activity around Black Friday dates is quite good result.

Depends when the slim released. If it was after Black Friday, then no.
Xbox had a nice discount during Black Friday.

 

[kazuyamishima]

Thanks for the data. Wondering if it includes ps5 slim pre-orders (new hardware launch hype). Spiderman 2 recent release and some discounts eg. £200 off ps5 when you buy Sony tv probably helped with sales. Xbox staying flat with so much Sony activity around Black Friday dates is quite good result.

A few key points:
- pre orders are not included
- The TV + PS5 is NOT cheap.
- Xbox had plenty of aggressive deals for BF, especially for Xbox series X and better supply than last year, so staying flat is NOT good.

 

[Thirty7ven]

Thanks for the data. Wondering if it includes ps5 slim pre-orders (new hardware launch hype). Spiderman 2 recent release and some discounts eg. £200 off ps5 when you buy Sony tv probably helped with sales. Xbox staying flat with so much Sony activity around Black Friday dates is quite good result.

Lmao you gotta be joking surely. Yes they were selling Xbox at OG prices. The spin is crazy.

 

[jm89]

Black Friday is one week of sales.

Depends when the slim released. If it was after Black Friday, then no.
Xbox had a nice discount during Black Friday.

Yeah in the UK slim was released after black Friday, on the 29th of November to be exact. Wouldn't be included in this report.

 

[mckmas8808]

Yeah in the UK slim was released after black Friday, on the 29th of November to be exact. Wouldn't be included in this report.

This is INSANE! This is news to me. I thought the slim was included in these sales.

 

[kazuyamishima]

This is INSANE! This is news to me. I thought the slim was included in these sales.

Launch date at most European countries for the Slim was November 29th, only France and Spain got it on the 23rd(France) and 24th (Spain).

 

[jm89]

This is INSANE! This is news to me. I thought the slim was included in these sales.

Looking at the footer of the image in the article the dates he covered in the report for bf week was from the 19th-25th which is week 47 2023, with slim launching on the 29th it wouldn't be included.