Since its launch in November 2020, the PlayStation 5 (PS5) has been pretty difficult to come by for gamers. Still, even with some struggles, the PS5 has continued to see impressive overall sales.
The PS5 has seen over 30 million units sold as of the end of 2022, which is impressive for a console released during a global pandemic and product shortage. However, it still lags behind the PS4 in total sales for the same 26-month time period from initial release. That begs the question, when will the PS5 start to pass the PS4 in sales?
Thanks to the latest data from VGChartz, we might be able to get an idea as to when that will happen.
PS5 Sales Are On The Rise
Now, before talking about the future, let’s talk about what has happened. We need to look at the windows from when each console was released to its 26-month for sale. According to VGChartz’s latest data, the PS5 has sold approximately 30.4 million units in its first 26 months. The PS4 sold 35.9 million units over that same period from November 2013 to December 2015.
That’s a total sales gap of over 5 million consoles. The gap does shrink a bit when you look at the 12-month window from months 14-26 on the market. In that same span, the PS4 only leads the PS5 in sales by 3.9 million.
While the overall difference in sales is noticeable, it can be attributed to what was mentioned earlier: pandemic and product shortages. Still, there is a positive sign for PS5 sales that you can see once the data is visually presented.
The chart above comes directly from VGChartz. As you can see, there was a steady overlay between the PS5 and PS4 for a while until a decent gap began to appear. But then take a look at the end of that line for the PS5. Notice the turn up right before it hits month 26. While it looks to be following a trajectory similar to that of the last-gen system, there’s a good chance that with the promise of more PS5 stock by Sony, the strong sales will continue.
That means it’s quite possible that the PS5 starts to outsell the PS4 within the next 6-12 months. It was month 31 that the PS4 passed 40 million in sales while month 38 saw it surpass 50 million. For the PS5, it’s not ridiculous to think that it will hit the 50 million mark quicker than the PS4. Again, though, that’s going based of Sony’s claims that stock will start to better meet the demand moving forward.
As of the new year, The PS4 has sold over 117 million consoles worldwide.
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