As part of Sony’s fiscal year 2024 fourth quarter financial report, we learned that PS5 shipments have reached 77.8 million units to date. In the last quarter, Sony only shipped 2.8 million units of the PlayStation 5 console, a significant decrease from the 4.5 million units shipped in Q4 FY 2023. Full-year PS5 sales are also down: Sony sold 18.5 million units in fiscal year 2024, down from the 20.8 million consoles sold in fiscal year 2023.
Sony also shared the forecast for fiscal year 2025, and the expectation is that PlayStation 5 hardware sales will decrease even further. However, this will be offset by first-party software sales, which are expected to increase with the release of titles like Ghost of Yotei, now set to launch on October 2.
FY2025 Forecast (year-on-year)
◼ Sales: 370.0 billion yen (8%) decrease
·(ー) Decrease in sales of hardware due to a decrease in unit sales
·(ー) Impact of foreign exchange rates
·(+) Increase in sales of first-party game software titles
·(+) Increase in sales of non-first-party game software titles including add-on content
◼ OI: 65.2 billion yen（16%) increase
·(+) Impact of increase in sales of first-party game software titles
Truth be told, even this year’s PS5 hardware sales decrease was largely offset by software sales on PS4 and PS5, which increased from 2023’s 286.4 million units to 2024’s 303.3 million units. However, most of them were for third-party games, whereas first-party game sales decreased from 39.7 million units to 28.9 million units year-over-year. The digital download ratio of full game software sales on PS4 and PS5 rose from 2023’s 70% to 2024’s 76%.
Sony also highlighted the 5% year-over-year increase in Monthly Active Users (MAUs), which rose from Q4 2023’s 118 million to Q4 2024’s 124 million. Admittedly, there’s the fact that some PC games now require access to the PlayStation Network, which wasn’t really the case last year. This could have contributed to the higher figure registered in 2024.
