Yeah, the PS5 might have already sold 10 million units, but you know what? Microsoft just fired back in its most recent earnings call with investors discussing its fourth-quarter earnings results.
For the three months ending on June 30, 2021, Microsoft's personal computing division saw its revenue jump 9% to $14.1 billion. That's the same division that includes Xbox and also a whole lot of Xbox Series X|S sales.
In fact, according to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella (via Seeking Alpha), ”the Xbox Series S and X are our fastest-selling consoles ever, with more consoles sold live to date than any previous generation.”
Nadella didn't say exactly how many Xboxes were sold, but sales are certainly on track for the Xbox Series X|S to be Microsoft's best-selling generation of consoles ever.
Diving into the numbers, we see that Xbox's gaming revenue was up 11% to $356 million compared to the same time last year, with most of that driven by Xbox Series X|S sales. Hardware revenue was up 172% in Q4, which can be attributed to the fact that Microsoft wasn't selling the current generation of consoles back in June of 2020.
But it wasn't all daisies and rainbows for Microsoft. Xbox's content and services subdivision saw a decline of 4% compared to the same time last year due to "a decline in third-party titles on a strong prior year comparable that benefitted from stay-at-home scenarios," according to GamesIndustry.biz. That said, Xbox Game Pass subscriptions still rose helping to offset some of those losses.
"Game Pass is growing rapidly and it’s transforming how people discover, connect and play games," Nadella said during the call. "Subscribers play approximately 40% more games and spend 50% more than nonmembers."
Besides selling home consoles, Xbox is also crossing over into confectionery thanks to a new Xbox Krispy Kreme donut. It’s got a big green X on it and is full of brownie batter, which sounds delightful.