Xbox Hardware Unit Sales Just Had Their Worst May In The U.S.

May was a solid month for video game software sales, with five titles debuting in the top 10 and spending up 1 percent year-over-year. And it was another great month for the Nintendo Switch 2, which is the second-fastest-selling piece of game hardware in U.S. history after a year on the market.

Now, uh, let’s just head over here and check on how Xbox and PlayStation are doing, shall we?

According to Circana’s monthly analysis, May 2026 was the worst May for Xbox hardware unit sales…ever. And PlayStation didn’t do much better, seeing its worst unit sales in a May month since 2000. It doesn’t take too much work to find out why, either. Per Circana, the average price paid for a new unit of video game hardware reached $502 in May, up 14 percent compared to a year ago ($440). PlayStation 5’s average price was up 33 percent from last year to $672, and Xbox Series price was up 22 percent, to $524.

Shocking as it sounds, these price increases do seem to be helping Xbox at least, rather than hurting. Xbox series hardware spending was up 7 percent year-over-year despite unit sales falling by 12 percent (though admittedly its numbers last year weren’t that great either). PlayStation has suffered a much worse fall from grace over the last year, with a 43-percent year-on-year drop in spending and a whopping 58-percent drop in unit sales. Yikes.

Meanwhile, the Nintendo Switch 2 was the best-selling platform in both units and dollar sales and remains the best-selling console year-to-date (the PS5 came in second in all cases).

The Switch 2 has reached 5.9 million unit sales in the U.S. after its first year on the market, and is the second-fastest-selling piece of gaming hardware in U.S. history, after the Game Boy Advance, which sold 6.5 million units in its first year. This will be the last month of data in which the Switch 2 isn’t competing against itself, so look forward to June when we’ll finally get to see how the Switch 2 is doing now in comparison to its first year on the market. Circana analyst Mat Piscatella suggested to me that given the way price increases are hurting hardware sales broadly, “it may be a tough one” for the Switch 2, though notably the Switch 2’s price won’t increase from its launch price until September 1.

In software, 007 First Light debuted last month as the best-selling game in May in the U.S. in full dollar sales. It was also the best-selling game on PlayStation platforms in May, and became the fourth-best-selling game of 2026 so far, according to Circana’s monthly report.

It was followed in second place for May by Forza Horizon 6, which was also the best-selling game of the month on both Xbox and PC. It is also now the fifth-best-selling game of the year so far. LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight was the third-best-selling game in May and the seventh-best-selling of the year so far, and Subnautica 2 was the fourth-best-selling game in May (it did not crack the top 10 for the year-to-date).

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book was the only other debut game cracking the top 10 in May, showing up at No.8. As a reminder, Circana’s new methodology includes projected sales for games that Circana does not have complete digital data for. This month, that includes not just Yoshi, but 007 First Light, Subnautica 2, Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream (No.5 for the month), Crimson Desert (No.7 for the month), and Mario Kart World (No.10).

Resident Evil Requiem remains the best-selling game of the year so far, followed by Crimson Desert.

I checked in with Piscatella to see if there were any other interesting anomalies on the platform charts this month, to which he told me that May “was really all about the new releases.” He did tell me that Indiana Jones and the Great Circle debuted at No.11 on the Nintendo platforms chart with its release on the Switch, which he called “not too shabby,” and that Directive 8020 launched at No.16 on PlayStation and twelfth on Xbox.

*Denotes games where some or all digital sales are projected by Circana