January 2024 Circana (NPD) covers the five week period from December 31 to February 3 and will be released on February 23.

Note, January is a five week month this year for Circana (NPD), compared to 4 weeks last year. Also VGChartz monthly estimates follows Circana (NPD), so our January 2024 estimates will be for five weeks.

Since Circana (NPD) leaks don't happen nearly as often as it used to and hardware revenue is something we do get, be sure to include revenue in your predictions.

Feel free to also predict what you think the top software games will be for the month.

Example prediction:

[Total Hardware Revenue]

1. [#1 selling console] XXX,000
2. [#2 selling console] XXX,000
3. [#3 selling console] XXX,000

VGChartz January 2023 estimates:

1. PS5 - 442K
2. NS - 272K
3. XSX|S - 217K

Results:

TLDR

Units: PS5 > NS > XS
Revenue: PS5 > XS > NS

Link to the VGChartz article here.

PS5 Best-Selling Console in the US in January, Palworld Most Popular Game on Steam

The PlayStation 5 was the best-selling console in the US in January 2024 in terms of units sold and dollar sales, according to figures from Circana (formerly The NPD Group). Circana includes the dates for the five week period of December 31 to February 3. It should be noted January 2023 was a four week perioud.

The Nintendo Switch was second best-selling console in terms of units sold, however, it ranked third in terms of dollar sales. This does mean the Xbox Series X|S came in third in terms of units sold, but came in second in terms of dollar sales.

After 39 months on the market, lifetime sales of the PlayStation 5 is tracking seven percent ahead of the PlayStation 4 and 68 percent ahead of the PlayStation 3.

The Xbox Series X|S is the only console to see growth year-over-year with sales up in the double-digit percentage range. Portable PC devices are included in the hardware revenue, which also saw growth compared to a year ago.

Overall spending on video games in January was up 15 percent year-on-year from $4.42 billion to $5.07 billion. Spending on video game content increased 15 percent from $3.86 billion to $4.45 billion, while video game hardware sales was down four percent from $396 million to $378 million. Spending on accessories increased 45 percent from $169 million to $246 million.

"Projected total market spending on video game hardware, content and accessories grew 15% in January compared to a year ago, reaching $5.1B," said Circana Executive Director and Video Game Industry Analyst Mat Piscatella.

Piscatella added, "A 15% increase in total projected spending on video game content drove the market’s overall gain. Growth in digital content spending across Console, PC and VR platforms, along with a 5% increase in mobile games spending (mobile source: Sensor Tower) led the way."

Palworld was the biggest story for new releases in January 2024. It was the most popular game on Steam for the month in the US in terms of monthly active users, while it came in third place on Xbox platforms behind Fortnite and Call of Duty HQ. The game did not appear on the premium charts as the publisher does not share digital sales.

Fortnite once again led monthly active users on the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, followed by Call of Duty HQ on both platforms. Enshrouded, along with Palworld, was one of two new releases in the top 10 monthly active users on the tracked platforms, placing seventh on Steam.

There were six new releases on the top 20 best-selling games chart for the tracked titles. Tekken 8 debuted in second place with unit and dollar sales higher than June 2017's Tekken 7.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League debuted in third place with sales lower than Batman: Arkham Knight.

Persona 3: Reload debuted in fourth place and Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth debuted in seventh place. Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown debuted in 13th place and Jujutsu Kaisen: Cursed Clash debuted in 19th place.

Here are the top 20 best-selling games in terms of dollars for January 2024:

Here are the top 10 games played on the PlayStation 5 ranked by monthly active users:

Here are the top 10 games played on the Xbox Series X|S ranked by monthly active users:

Here are the top 10 games played on Steam ranked by monthly active users:

Here are the top 10 best-selling premium games on PlayStation platforms in January 2024:

Here are the top 10 best-selling premium games on Xbox platforms in January 2024:

Here are the top 10 best-selling premium games on Nintendo platforms in January 2024:

[Total Hardware Revenue]

1. PS5 350k
2. Switch 280k
3. Xbox Series X/S 265k

[Top 20 Software]

1. Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth
2. Tekken 8
3. Last of Us Part II: Remastered 
4. Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
5. Super Mario Bros Wonder
6. Hogwarts Legacy
7. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III (2023)
8. Spider-Man 2
9. Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora
10. Mortal Kombat 1
11. Madden NFL 24
12. God of War: Ragnarok
13. Star Wars: Jedi Survivor
14. Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Trilogy
15. Sonic Superstars
16. NBA 2K24
17. EA Sports FC 24
18. Howl
19. Minecraft
20. Rugby 24

Good solid predictions.  I like how you have the ps5 number one and our good old friendly xbox in third. 

I won't make any predictions, but sales threads seems to have been dead for most of the past day.

PS5 300k
NSW 225k
Xbox Series 200k

I expect PS5 to be down quite a bit and Switch to be down a bit considering it's age. As for Xbox not really a reason to see much changing, though they didn't have a shadowdrop this month.

PS5 - 370k
Switch - 230k
XSX|S - 200k

The rankings for revenue and units will be the same in my mind.

As for numbers ... Here we go !

PS5 - 375K
Switch - 215K
Xbox Series - 180K

Revenue: 380m

[PS5] 400k
[NS] 275k
[XBS] 250k

January Circana (NPD) 2024 is out now!

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League debuted in third place with sales lower than Batman: Arkham Knight.

Persona 3: Reload debuted in third place and Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth debuted in seventh place. Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown debuted in 13th place and Jujutsu Kaisen: Cursed Clash debuted in 19th place.

Star Trek Computer Voice: Typo detected