December 2023 Circana (NPD) covers the five week period from November 26 to December 30 and will be released on January 18.

Since 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

Notes: The dates include Cyber Monday, Christmas, discounts on consoles, etc. 

• Xbox Series X discounted as low as $349 at some retailers, Microsoft discounted Xbox Series X to $399.
• Xbox Series S discounted to $149 at Costco (in store only), Xbox Series S starter bundle discounted to $249
• PS5 old model discounted to $449 at GameStop, and $499 bundles.

December 2022 Circana (NPD):

1. NS: ??? (Not leaked)
2. PS5: 1.331M (Leaked)
3. XSX|S: 0.942M (Leaked)

Results:

TLDR:

Units: PS5 > NS > XSX|S
Revenue: PS5 > NS > XSX|S

YTD Units: PS5 > NS > XSX|S
YTD Revenue: PS5 > NS > XSX|S

• PS hardware dollar sales set a new one month record for Sony, beating December 2022.
• Xbox Series X|S despite being in third had its best December ever. 
• PS5 and Xbox Series X|S unit sales are up by double digit percentages, while Switch is down by double digit percentages.

Link to the VGChartz article here.

PS5 Best-Selling Console in the US in December, Hogwarts Legacy Best-Seller in 2023

The PlayStation 5 was the best-selling console in the US in December 2023 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 November 26 to December 30.

The Nintendo Switch was second best-selling console in terms of units sold and dollar sales. The Xbox Series X|S was third best-selling console in terms of units sold and dollar sales.

Dollar sales for PlayStation hardware set a new one month record for Sony, beating the previous Sony record set in December 2022.

Unit sales for the Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5 are up by double-digit percentages, while Nintendo Switch sales are down by double-digit percentages.

The Xbox Series X|S did set a new lifetime high in the US in terms of unit sales for the month of December for the platform, beating the previous record set in December 2021.

Growth in Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5 hardware dollar sales offset a double-digit percentage decline for the Nintendo Switch.

For the entire year of 2023, the PlayStation 5 is the best-selling console in terms of both units sold and dollar sales. The Nintendo Switch comes in second place in both units sold and dollar sales, while the Xbox Series X|S comes in third place.

Overall spending on video games in December was up four percent year-on-year from $7.63 billion to $7.91 billion. Spending on video game content increased three percent from $5.57 billion to $5.73 billion, while video game hardware sales was up four percent from $1.54 billion to $ 1.60 billion.

Overall spending on video games in 2023 is up one percent from $56.62 billion to $57.19 billion. Spending on video game content is up one percent from $47.49 billion to $47.97 billion, while video game hardware sales dropped less than one percent from $6.60 billion to $6.59 billion.

"Annual U.S. spending on video game content, hardware and accessories reached $57.2 billion in 2023, an increase of 1% when compared to 2022," said Circana Executive Director and Video Game Industry Analyst Mat Piscatella. "December spending grew 4%, to $7.9 billion."

Piscatella added, "Video game content spending ended 2023 1% higher than 2022, driven by a 13% increase in digital premium download (full game) spending on console platforms."

Hogwarts Legacy ended 2023 as the best-selling game of the year in the US in terms of dollar sales. It is the first year since 2008 with Rock Band that a non-Call of Duty or Rockstar game ranked first place.

Hogwarts Legacy was the best-selling game of the year on PlayStation platforms, second on Xbox platforms, and fifth on Nintendo platforms.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 was the best-selling game in December and the second best-selling game of 2023. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was the seventh best-selling game of 2023. The Call of Duty franchise was the best-selling franchise in the US in 2023 for the 15th straight year.

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom was the best-selling game of 2023 on Nintendo platforms and the fifth best-selling overall, even though Nintendo does not share digital sales of its games.

Fortnite had the highest number of monthly active users in the US in December on the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, while it was Lethal Company on Steam. 36 percent of active PlayStation 5 players and 31 percent of active Xbox Series X|S players played Fortnite at least once during December.

Here are the top 20 best-selling games in terms of dollars for December 2023:

Here are the top 20 best-selling games in 2023 year-to-date:

Here are the top 20 games played on the PlayStation 5 ranked by monthly active users:

Here are the top 20 games played on the Xbox Series X|S ranked by monthly active users:

Here are the top 20 games played on Steam ranked by monthly active users:

Here are the top 20 best-selling premium games on PlayStation platforms in 2023:

Here are the top 20 best-selling premium games on Xbox platforms in 2023:

Here are the top 20 best-selling premium games on Nintendo platforms in 2023:

December 13? Or January 13?

I'm curious to see if the PS5 was able to keep the strong November sales going.

My bad. Actually will be released on January 18. 

PS5- 2 million
xbox- 1 million
switch- 800k

1. PS5 - 2.155m
2. Nintendo Switch - 960.000
3. Xbox Series - 906.000

Switch unit sales for December 2022 were >1.33m but <1.49m. This is because it was ahead of PS5 in unit sales going into December and finished the year 170k ahead (5.83m to 5.66m) so the most it could have been ahead in December 2022 was 160k.

https://www.neogaf.com/threads/npd-december-2022-and-for-the-year-2022-1-mw2-2-pokemon-3-god-of-war-nsw-1-units-ps5-2-ps5-1-revenue-nsw-2.1650121/

https://www.neogaf.com/threads/circana-npd-hardware-sales-for-2022-nsw-5830k-ps5-5660k-xbs-4480k.1659997/

PS5- 1.42 million
NSW- 1.05 million
XBS - 0.85 million

Holiday months are always tricky to predict, especially after an unexpectedly slow month like Nov. 2023, but here goes:

PS5: 1500k
XBO: 950k
NSW: 800k

Revenue: 1.6 bil

[PS5] 2 mil
[NS] 1.15 mil
[XBS] 800k

PS5, 1.5 million
Swirch 1 million
Xbox Series 750k

I think the holiday sales in USA will be lacking this year for all platforms.