Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom sold 1.5m boxed copies in Japan in May | Japan Monthly Charts

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom dominated the physical charts in Japan for May, unsurprisingly.

According to data from Famitsu, the Nintendo title had sold 1.5 million boxed copies as of May 28.

Looking at the weekly breakdown, Tears of the Kingdom sold 1.1 million copies on May’s second week alone. Considering the title released on the Friday of that week (May 12), that means that it sold these 1.1 million units within three days.

Famitsu noted that Tears of the Kingdom far outweighed its predecessor, with Breath of the Wild having sold 346,000 copies by its third weekend back in March 2017.

The title was also far ahead of competition for May, with the month's No.2, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, selling over 47,000 copies in the meantime. Debuting at No.3, the PS4 version of Hogwarts Legacy sold 43,000 units.

Having reclaimed its top spot last month, the Switch topped the hardware charts again in May as a result of Zelda's launch. The Switch OLED represented 52.8% of new hardware sales in May, compared to 47% in April. That represented a bit over 274,000 units sold. Taking into account all three models of the Switch, the console sold 345,000 units in May in Japan.

The PS5 maintained its second place in the hardware charts, representing 28% of sales (over 145,000 units).

It's worth noting that Nintendo games took seven of the top ten spots in May, with Breath of the Wild returning at No.6.

Here are Japan's top ten best-selling physical games from May 1 to May 28, 2023, courtesy of Famitsu:

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