In a recent report published by Newzoo, the full-year game performance metrics for 2025 were revealed. The graphs and numbers told a telling tale about the state of play across both console and PC markets, revealing the biggest movers and shakers, and by contrast, the games that fell out of fortune with players worldwide last year.
Two slides in particular, one addressing the biggest money-makers on console and the other answering the same question on PC, offered a sort of axiomatic revelation. Year after year, console gamers can’t escape their sports games.
Sports Games Don’t Make Money on PC
Newzoo’s newest annual report breaks down the numbers across PC and console for a 12-month spread, uncovering the best-selling games, the titles with the highest revenue, and those with the most sizeable MAU counts.
On the PC front, the top ten games by revenue (in six major markets) were:
- Battlefield 6
- ARC Raiders
- Schedule 1
- Monster Hunter: Wilds
- Borderlands 4
- EA Sports FC 26
- R.E.P.O.
- Oblivion Remastered
- Expedition 33
- Kingdom Come: Deliverance II
By contrast, the console market seemed laser-focused on sports games in 2025:
- EA Sports FC 26
- NBA 2K26
- Battlefield 6
- Madden NFL 26
- MLB The Show 25
- Assassin’s Creed Shadows
- EA Sports College Football 26
- Pokémon Legends: Z-A
- Ghost of Yotei
- ARC Raiders
Those lists indicate that 50% of the best-selling games on console platforms in 2025 were all annual sports releases. These are the relatively safe, simple purchases that players often make out of habit rather than anything else. As the report indicates, this is suggestive of PC players being more ‘experimental’ in their gaming habits.
You get a lot of early access titles launching on PC, for instance. It gives players a more diverse repository to pull from, even if a lot of those games fall flat because they remain in that state for too long.
The MAU stakes on console are drastically different, though. At the top of the table sits Fortnite, followed by Call of Duty, then GTA 5, Roblox, and Minecraft. You don’t get into a sports title until the sixth spot on the list, and even then, it’s EA Sports FC 25, which is followed swiftly enough by EA Sports FC 26.
Rocket League is arguably a sports title, and that sits in seventh place for console players, but it’s not an annual release.
The PC MAU trend is pretty similar to console. The number-one spot is secured by Counter-Strike 2, but Minecraft, Roblox, and Fortnite are all in the top five. Call of Duty finds a place in the top ten as well, but the other games are made up mostly of those that are unique to PC, like League of Legends and Dota 2.
In 2024, Newzoo revealed that PC gaming gained more new players than console platforms, which was an eye-opener. It was also revealed that 58% of PC gaming revenue came from microtransactions.
Are you surprised to see which games were the best-sellers in 2025? Let us know your thoughts on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
For more Insider Gaming coverage, check out our review of World War Z x The Walking Dead
Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
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