UK PC and console sales grew 2.6% in 2023 | UK Annual Report

38 million video games were sold in the UK during 2023, the latest GSD figures reveal.

It's a slight increase of 2.6% over the year before, with EA Sports FC 24 continuing where FIFA left off as the UK's best-selling video game.

Sales for the rebranded series are down 8.4% over the year before to 2.39 million units sold. It's worth noting that FIFA 23 benefitted from the FIFA World Cup, which ran over December 2022.

It was another strong year for Warner Bros. After securing the No.3 best-selling UK game in 2022 (LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga), the company has gone one better with Hogwarts Legacy, which easily beat Call of Duty to No.2.

The Harry Potter spin-off was also the best-selling physical game of the year. It had a protracted release, with the PC, PS5 and Xbox Series S and X versions launching in February, the PS4 and Xbox One editions arriving in May, before reaching Nintendo Switch in November.

At No.3 in the charts is Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. Although it was billed as a full sequel to 2022's Modern Warfare 2, fans felt it was more like an expansion, which may explain why its sales are nearly 39% lower compared with the previous year's game. Modern Warfare 2 was also on sale a little longer, having launched in October, whereas Modern Warfare 3 arrived in November.

EA Sports FC 24, Hogwarts Legacy and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 all had marketing partnerships with PlayStation, and over half of those games' sales were on Sony formats.

It wasn't the strongest year for new IP (unless you count EA Sports FC). The highest charting new IP released last year was Starfield, which reached No.31. The best-selling new IP of 2022 was Elden Ring, which reached No.4. Elden Ring is at No.28 in the 2023 chart.

It was a strong year for Disney IP. Spider-Man 2 from PlayStation just missed out on the Top Five at No.6, and it's followed closely by Star Wars Jedi: Survivor by EA.

Nintendo doesn't share digital data with the charts, so its games' performance is based entirely on physical sales. As a result, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (No.9) and Super Mario Bros Wonder (No.11) will have charted higher if we had access to the download figures.

Other notable new releases in the Top 20 include Assassin's Creed Mirage at No.14, the remake of Resident Evil 4 at No.15, NBA 2K23 at No.16, WWE 2K23 at No.18 and F1 23 at No.19.

Also within the Top 100 are Dead Island 2 (No.25), Dead Space Remake (No.29), Mortal Kombat 1 (No.30), Starfield (No.31), Final Fantasy 16 (No.32), EA Sports UFC 5 (No.47), Avatar Frontiers of Pandora (No.54), Street Fighter 6 (No.56), Sonic Superstars (No.63), The Crew Motorfest (No.66), Just Dance 2024 (No.81), Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon (No.84) and Forspoken (No.96).

There are a few games missing from this chart because their publishers aren't included in the GSD data. The most notable game that's missing is Baldur's Gate 3.

A big year for PS5, but sales drops elsewhere

2.38 million games consoles were sold during the year in the UK, according to GfK panel data. That's a rise of 9.4% over the year before.

PS5 was the driver behind this. Sony's console saw sales rise 55.2% over 2022, making it the biggest year yet for new PlayStation. It's actually the best year for a PlayStation machine since 2014.

The other console to post year-on-year growth was, interestingly, PS4. Sales of PS4 were up 633% year-on-year. Like with PS5, this is due to severe console shortages that plagued PlayStation consoles throughout the year prior.

Elsewhere, Nintendo Switch ended the year as the No.2 console, but sales are down 16.7% over the year before. This is the Switch's seventh year on the market and a decline was expected.

Narrowly behind Switch is the Xbox Series S and X, which saw sales drop 14.2% over the year before.

Over in accessories, nine million products were sold at UK retail in 2023, a drop of 4.5% over the year before, despite improved console sales.

UK GSD 2023 Top 20 (Digital and Physical)

*Digital data unavailable

GSD digital data includes games from participating companies sold via PC digital stores, Xbox Live, PlayStation Network, Nintendo Eshop. Major participating companies are Activision Blizzard, Bandai Namco, Capcom, Codemasters, Electronic Arts, Embracer Group (including Gearbox, Koch Media, Sabre Interactive), Focus Entertainment, Kepler, Konami, Marvellous Games, Microids, Microsoft (including Bethesda), Milestone, Nacon, Paradox Interactive, Quantic Dream, Sega, Sony, Square Enix, Take-Two, Ubisoft and Warner Bros. Nintendo and 505 Games are the notable absentees, alongside smaller studios.