Microsoft is cutting the price of its Xbox One console again.
This time, the Redmond company is discounting the Xbox One with Kinect. Microsoft on Friday announced that it will drop $50 off the Xbox One with Kinect, making the console available for $449 from Feb. 8 to Feb. 21.
Meanwhile, the Xbox One without a Kinect is still $349 — Microsoft is calling the discount a “limited-time promotion,” even though company dropped the price of the console to $349 in November. Four months before that, Microsoft began selling the Kinect-less console for $399 — $100 less than the Xbox One with Kinect, which had been the only buying option since the November 2013 launch.
The price cuts resulted in a sales spike for the Xbox One, as Microsoft was able to outpace Sony in the U.S. and win the console race for both December and November after Sony came out on top for the previous ten months.
But as GeekWire noted earlier this week, that still wasn’t enough to lift the company to an overall victory in the global numbers during last year’s holiday season. During 2014 as a whole, Sony reported 18.8 million PlayStation consoles sold for the year, with Microsoft at 12.1 million Xbox units, and Nintendo trailing the pack, selling 3.9 million units of its Wii and Wii U consoles.
The $449 Xbox One is not the only deal available now, though. If you’ve been holding off on purchasing an Xbox Live membership, now might be a good time to buy one.
Microsoft just discounted its 12-month Xbox Live membership by 33 percent to $39.99, down from the normal price of $59.99. The deal is available at the Microsoft Store online, Best Buy, and Amazon. Newegg is actually selling it for $37.99.
An Xbox Live Gold membership gives gamers access benefits like multiplayer gaming, free games, and other discounts. We’ve reached out to Microsoft to see if this is a temporary price cut — the company has implemented similar discounts in the past — and will update when we hear back.
Microsoft also today rolled out its first big update of 2015 for the Xbox One.
