The Xbox Series X/S managed to outsell both the PS5 and the Nintendo Switch in the UK last month.
The gaming world has been keeping a closer eye than usual on console sales over the course of the past three months. November 2020 marked the beginning of the next generation of consoles, and both the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S have enjoyed terrific launches. In fact, Xbox's new consoles outsold both the PS5 and the Nintendo Switch in the UK last month.
That's a pretty big deal for a few reasons. First of all, Xbox is already doing everything it can to pick up a win over PlayStation this generation. The closest it has come to doing that previously was via the 360, but it lost a lot of the ground it made up during the Xbox One generation. Outselling the Switch is also a big deal, as the console continues to dominate around the world despite the arrival of new rivals.
However, the most fun observation, made by GamesIndustry.biz's Christopher Dring, can be seen in the tweet below. Xbox's dominance in the UK last month means a different console has led the way for each of the past three months. The PS5 topped the charts in November, Nintendo took the mantle back in December, and now Xbox has notched up the first win of 2021.
There are some caveats to this, of course. If there were unlimited numbers of all three consoles in stock, then it's probably safe to assume the PS5 would have returned to the top of the mountain. However, Sony's new console has been notoriously hard to come by in the UK, and everywhere else for that matter. The Series X/S consoles have as well, but clearly, there have been more stock drops for the Xbox consoles since the turn of the year.
A win for Xbox, but it still won't be able to sell as many consoles as it would like for a little while yet. Xbox has already stated console shortages will continue beyond the first few months of this year, and AMD predicts new-gen consoles won't be readily available until the second half of this year at least. In terms of the Switch, now the holiday season has been and gone, it's unsurprising that its sales have died down a little.