Nintendo has posted its end-of-year report for FY2023 and as of March 2023, the Switch family of systems has sold over 3 million since the last quarter, bringing the lifetime total number of units sold to a cool 125.62 million.
Back in February the total stood at 122.55, which took sales past the milestones set by both the Game Boy (118.69 units) and Sony’s PlayStation 4 (117.2), although the Nintendo DS is still ahead in the ranks of best-selling video game consoles, with a whopping 154.02 million lifetime sales to its name. And Sony’s PS2 tops the table with 155 million.
Switch OLED was the most popular SKU in the last financial year, although overall hardware sales declined by 22.1{d0f68332078ae50ae5cd49ede95b9d76bcf00fa473a5a7068cdab9d644705628} year-on-year, with sales slowing over the 2022 holiday season compared to the previous year. While the numbers are relatively healthy given this point in Switch’s lifecycle heading into its seventh year, it’s clear that things are slowing down for the console.
(If you’re wondering, the recently released Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Switch OLED isn’t accounted for in these lifetime Switch numbers, so the true figure at the time of writing will now be higher than those reported.)
Here’s the breakdown by SKU followed by their percentage change year-on-year:
Nintendo Switch – 6.14 million units (-54.7.1{d0f68332078ae50ae5cd49ede95b9d76bcf00fa473a5a7068cdab9d644705628})
Nintendo Switch – OLED Model – 9.22 million units (+58.8{d0f68332078ae50ae5cd49ede95b9d76bcf00fa473a5a7068cdab9d644705628})
Nintendo Switch Lite – 2.62 million units (-29.2{d0f68332078ae50ae5cd49ede95b9d76bcf00fa473a5a7068cdab9d644705628})
And here’s how things stand compared to Nintendo’s previous console sales:
| Console | Total Sales |
|---|---|
| DS | 154.02 Million |
| Switch | 125.62 Million |
| Game Boy | 118.69 Million |
| Wii | 101.63 Million |
| Game Boy Advance | 81.51 Million |
| 3DS | 75.94 Million |
| Family Computer / NES | 61.91 Million |
| Super Family Computer / SNES | 49.10 Million |
| N64 | 32.93 Million |
| GameCube | 21.74 Million |
| Wii U | 13.56 Million |
Can Switch catch the PS2 to become the best-selling console in history? Well, with games like Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and its themed Switch OLED SKU sure to give a sales bump, and with people upgrading their ageing Switches with shiny new versions, there’s certainly life left in the system yet, so we wouldn’t be surprised.
However, the decline in sales suggests it’ll be a struggle without heavy discounting. Nintendo will surely be eyeing Holiday 2023 as an opportunity — perhaps the last big one? — to give Switch a big sales push, so discounted bundles would seem likely.
