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Forums - Sales Discussion - Will this be the last year PS4 outsells Switch?

LethalP said:

PS4 might sell 19-20 million this year, maybe more. But it's probable that it starts to slow down in 2019 beyond. The Switch on the other hand has only started out, and has many years left. There are those who already think Switch will outsell PS4 this year but assuming it doesn't, I myself think this is the last 18+ million selling year for PS4.

Do you think Switch will take the reigns as sales king in 2019 and going forward?

It's not even sure that the PS4 will outsell the Switch this year. Sure, PS4 is in front for now but a) it's tracking well below last year's sales despite the release of such great sellers like God of War and Monster Hunter World, so it will most likely not sell as well as you might expect and b) Switch had a rocky start this year with barely any high profile releases, but starting with Mario Tennis Aces the bigger releases are coming in for the second half of the year and culminating in a Smash and Pokémon 1-2 punch and possibly a great black Friday deal for the holiday season. 

With both Smash and Pokémon in this holiday season this holiday season will belong to Nintendo. Sony needs to build up a sizeable advantage in sales to fend off the assault from Nintendo, even with a probable pricecut for the PS4 in the meanwhile. 



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Bofferbrauer2 said:
LethalP said:

PS4 might sell 19-20 million this year, maybe more. But it's probable that it starts to slow down in 2019 beyond. The Switch on the other hand has only started out, and has many years left. There are those who already think Switch will outsell PS4 this year but assuming it doesn't, I myself think this is the last 18+ million selling year for PS4.

Do you think Switch will take the reigns as sales king in 2019 and going forward?

It's not even sure that the PS4 will outsell the Switch this year. Sure, PS4 is in front for now but a) it's tracking well below last year's sales despite the release of such great sellers like God of War and Monster Hunter World, so it will most likely not sell as well as you might expect and b) Switch had a rocky start this year with barely any high profile releases, but starting with Mario Tennis Aces the bigger releases are coming in for the second half of the year and culminating in a Smash and Pokémon 1-2 punch and possibly a great black Friday deal for the holiday season. 

With both Smash and Pokémon in this holiday season this holiday season will belong to Nintendo. Sony needs to build up a sizeable advantage in sales to fend off the assault from Nintendo, even with a probable pricecut for the PS4 in the meanwhile. 

I very much doubt that. 2017 had mario kart, mario odyssey, zelda, and splatoon 2, along with switch  being a new hot product that was supply limited till near the holidays, switch won't be dominating anything, probably in japan it will.



quickrick said:
Bofferbrauer2 said:

It's not even sure that the PS4 will outsell the Switch this year. Sure, PS4 is in front for now but a) it's tracking well below last year's sales despite the release of such great sellers like God of War and Monster Hunter World, so it will most likely not sell as well as you might expect and b) Switch had a rocky start this year with barely any high profile releases, but starting with Mario Tennis Aces the bigger releases are coming in for the second half of the year and culminating in a Smash and Pokémon 1-2 punch and possibly a great black Friday deal for the holiday season. 

With both Smash and Pokémon in this holiday season this holiday season will belong to Nintendo. Sony needs to build up a sizeable advantage in sales to fend off the assault from Nintendo, even with a probable pricecut for the PS4 in the meanwhile. 

I very much doubt that. 2017 had mario kart, mario odyssey, zelda, and splatoon 2, along with switch  being a new hot product that was supply limited till near the holidays, switch won't be dominating anything, probably in japan it will.

Why are you using games that released in Spring/Summer last year when hes talking about holiday lineup?



When the herd loses its way, the shepard must kill the bull that leads them astray.

quickrick said:
Bofferbrauer2 said:

It's not even sure that the PS4 will outsell the Switch this year. Sure, PS4 is in front for now but a) it's tracking well below last year's sales despite the release of such great sellers like God of War and Monster Hunter World, so it will most likely not sell as well as you might expect and b) Switch had a rocky start this year with barely any high profile releases, but starting with Mario Tennis Aces the bigger releases are coming in for the second half of the year and culminating in a Smash and Pokémon 1-2 punch and possibly a great black Friday deal for the holiday season. 

With both Smash and Pokémon in this holiday season this holiday season will belong to Nintendo. Sony needs to build up a sizeable advantage in sales to fend off the assault from Nintendo, even with a probable pricecut for the PS4 in the meanwhile. 

I very much doubt that. 2017 had mario kart, mario odyssey, zelda, and splatoon 2, along with switch  being a new hot product that was supply limited till near the holidays, switch won't be dominating anything, probably in japan it will.

These games brought the Switch baseline up to where it is nowadays, and it shows on the weekly software sales charts as they show their super long legs. However the Switch is still missing many key franchises, with Smash, Fire Emblem and some Pokémon games already announced for this year alone. Add to this more, newer and bigger 3rd party games like Octopath Traveller, Dark Souls and probably Fortnite and you can be pretty sure that the Switch will take up the slack and lead the sales charts in the second half of the year, and dominate during the holiday season. And that's without any new game announcements during E3. 



Bofferbrauer2 said:
quickrick said:

I very much doubt that. 2017 had mario kart, mario odyssey, zelda, and splatoon 2, along with switch  being a new hot product that was supply limited till near the holidays, switch won't be dominating anything, probably in japan it will.

These games brought the Switch baseline up to where it is nowadays, and it shows on the weekly software sales charts as they show their super long legs. However the Switch is still missing many key franchises, with Smash, Fire Emblem and some Pokémon games already announced for this year alone. Add to this more, newer and bigger 3rd party games like Octopath Traveller, Dark Souls and probably Fortnite and you can be pretty sure that the Switch will take up the slack and lead the sales charts in the second half of the year, and dominate during the holiday season. And that's without any new game announcements during E3. 

yea i heard before, it was suppose dominate 2018, now it wait till those games releases.



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zorg1000 said:
quickrick said:

I very much doubt that. 2017 had mario kart, mario odyssey, zelda, and splatoon 2, along with switch  being a new hot product that was supply limited till near the holidays, switch won't be dominating anything, probably in japan it will.

Why are you using games that released in Spring/Summer last year when hes talking about holiday lineup?

Because those games are evergreens, and usually come out once a generation,  it doesn't matter they came in spring/summer,  it was there first holiday on the market.



Probably not. Sony is more focused on ww sales over sales in a few specific regions.



quickrick said:
zorg1000 said:

Why are you using games that released in Spring/Summer last year when hes talking about holiday lineup?

Because those games are evergreens, and usually come out once a generation,  it doesn't matter they came in spring/summer,  it was there first holiday on the market.

Ok so if they are evergreens than shouldnt they also have an effect this holiday? What about other games like Kirby, Donkey Kong, Mario Tennis, etc which will be having their first holiday?

So this holiday will have two very big hitters, last years evergreens, this years mid-tier releases and most likely some holiday bundles/promotions.

I just dont get why you are so convinced Switch wont have as good or better of a holiday than last year.



When the herd loses its way, the shepard must kill the bull that leads them astray.

LethalP said:
Nautilus said:

And you expect Sony to sell another 15 million units next year?Even when the PS4 would have probably passed 90 millions and be extremely close to 100 millions?You need to understand that there is eventually a saturation point that every console eventually reach.There are so many humans in the world interested in videogames that you can sell your console to.The high quality gamesthat are still going to release on the PS4 this year, like KH III, RDR 2 and so on, will move consoles, but wont move as much as they would normaly if released early in the console life, simply because thew audience for said games already has a PS4.PS4 is an amazing console, but its not a miracle worker.

Im not even going to adress the Switch factor here, given your bias against the company.Even if I pointed out that Nintendo is far from being empty on ammunition, since there is still Animal Crossing, 2D Mario, Bayonetta 3, a core Pokemon, new IPs and so on left, you wouldnt still acknoledge those circunstances, to put it lightly, and you will keep claiming as you were last year, that Nintendo already burned through most of their franchises,.So I believe that just pointing out the Sony factor as enough proof should be adequate, and spour a better discussion.

What reason is there to suggest that people will just stop buying PS4's simply because there's 'so many already'? We have all seen the ceiling for PS consoles, and the PS4 is basically following that blueprint to the T. I don't think it will sell 155 million+, but I do expect at least 110 million sold by the release of the PS5 in November 2020.

Expecting 15 million in 2019 doesn't sound crazy at all. The world won't just suddenly run out of potential PS4 customers. It didn't happen to the PS2, why the PS4? Mind share and library are only getting better and better for the PS4. It's had record breaking months and has several mega blockbusters for this year both first and third party. It has a pretty positive road map of games going forward and I don't see any reason for PS4 to drastically slow down.

That said, 2019 will not sell as many PS4's as 2017-2018, but I also expect more than 15 million as well.

Normal sales trends for PS-consoles let us assume this. Look at this, if we assume the following trend:

FY 2018/19: 16M (as forecasted by Sony)

FY 2019/20: 14M

FY 2020/21: 10M

FY 2021/22: 5M

This puts the PS4 at the end past the 120M sales target, but still you see a decline in sales already this year. If you assume 20M for PS4 this year, you practically expect the PS4 to sell past 150M.



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VAMatt said:
I don't trust Nintendo's forecasts at all. They've proven time and time again that they have no idea how many units they will sell. So, the fact that they've forecasted more Switch sales than Sony has forecast for PS4 means very little.

I'm thinking PS4 will outsell Switch in 2018. Next year is a lot harder to call. If Nintendo will do some discounting, and they have some big titles to announce (such as a 2D Mario and Kart 9), it seems reasonable to believe that Switch will take the lead in annual sales at that point. Then again, Nintendo is infamous for missing launch dates for games. So, if they delay big 2018 titles into 2019, or delay big 2019 titles into 2020, that throws a bunch of question marks all over the place, and I have no idea what to expect in terms of console sales.

They still haven't delayed one first party game for Switch, I think they don't want to underwhelm fans expectations, heck they even moved Odyssey from a Holiday title to the Fall of 2017... Also the sales forecasts for Switch have always been on the consevative side since they didn't know how popular it could get, considering many Pokémon fans still have to purchase one and that Smash is one of their biggest Killer Apps I think the 20M forecast is realistic, the fiscal year ends in March 2019, the first half of 2019 will have more games than this year, leading to a rise in sales in the slowest quarter of Switch's first year