Point, Xbox One.
Microsoft announced today that for the second straight month, the Xbox One outsold Sony’s PlayStation 4 in the U.S. for December. The Redmond company also sold more Xbox One games during the past two months than any current-generation platform, including the PS4.
Microsoft also said on Thursday that it would drop the Xbox One price back down to $349 for a “promotion.” Since Nov. 2, the company sold the Kinect-less Xbox One for $349, but then brought the price back up to $399 earlier this month. For whatever reason, the company has changed its mind again and will start selling the console for $349 — only in the U.S. — on Friday.
Since both consoles launched in November 2013, Sony had outpaced Microsoft in sales for ten consecutive months up until this past November. In the midst of that run, Microsoft began selling a $399 version of the Xbox One without the Kinect sensor — $100 less than the Xbox One with Kinect, which had been the only buying option since launch. In November, Microsoft again dropped the price, this time to $349, while several retailers sold bundle deals that effectively made the console less than $300.
The price cuts have helped Microsoft jump ahead of Sony in the console war, but the PS4 is certainly not struggling to sell. Earlier this month, Sony announced at CES that it has sold 18.5 million PS4 consoles — which have always been $399 — to consumers worldwide since November 2013. The company previously announced in October that it sold 13.5 million PS4s, so the company sold about 4.5 million consoles this holiday season.
Microsoft last reported its worldwide Xbox One sales in November, when it noted 10 million consoles sold to retailers (not consumers).
The company also said today that weekly average sales for the Xbox One were 50 percent better in November and December compared to Xbox 360 sales during the same lifecycle time period.
The NPD Group reported today that cumulative sales of the PS4 and Xbox One exceeded the Xbox 360 and PS3 cumulative 14-month total by 65 percent. In addition, total video game hardware sales in 2014 were up 20 percent from 2013 to $5.07 billion.
