2020 UK Nintendo Switch sales have more than doubled compared to last year
Hardware sales surged during lockdown, VGC understands
UK Nintendo Switch hardware sales have more than doubled in the first half of 2020 compared to the first six months of last year, VGC understands.
The Switch sales surge, which began in early March and peaked in May, can largely be attributed to an increase in interest around video games as the nation was in lockdown due to the coronavirus.
But it was also fuelled by the arrival of new hardware stock in May, following a period when Switch consoles were sold out at many retailers across the country.
PlayStation 4 and Xbox One hardware sales are also up year-on-year by around 50% and 25% respectively, people with knowledge of the data told VGC.
The hardware sales momentum continued in June, which was a significantly better month than in 2019, we were told.
In North America Switch enjoyed similar success during the first five months of the year, according to the NPD Group.
Between January and April, Nintendo Switch broke the all-time record for dollar sales. The following month, Switch unit sales were the highest for an individual platform in a May month since the Nintendo DS in May 2009.
In its March report, NPD also said Switch set a new all-time record for hardware unit sales in a March month, and recorded the strongest first quarter unit sales of any platform since the DS in 2010.
European market research firm GfK has said that over one million games were sold during the UK lockdown’s overall games sales peak in April, making it the most successful April for physical game sales in five years.
According to the same data, all three console platforms enjoyed a significant increase in sales after the UK introduced social isolation measures, with over half a million games consoles sold across the nation between March and April – a rise of more than 48% over the same period in 2019.
Almost 210,000 games consoles were sold in April, generating in excess of £50 million.
In total, boxed games, accessories and consoles generated more than £130 million for UK games retailers last month, according to GfK data analysed and reported on by GamesIndsutry.biz.
