Sony PS5 sales drop 46%, even before recent price increase

Sony increased the price of the PlayStation 5 ($539 on Amazon) in March – again. While the PlayStation 5 did cost $399 or $499 at launch in 2020, depending on whether it was purchased with or without a disc drive, Sony is now charging list prices of $599 and $649 respectively. The fact that the console is becoming more expensive rather than cheaper over time is unsurprisingly having an impact on demand.

According to Sony's latest financial report, the company was only able to sell 1.5 million PlayStation 5s in the fourth quarter of the 2025 financial year, which ran from January 1 to March 31, 2026. In contrast, 2.8 million PS5s were sold in the same quarter of the previous year, meaning sales dropped by over 46 percent. Over the financial year as a whole, the decline is not quite as drastic - sales fell from 18 million to 16.5 million, a drop of 8.3 percent. While sales of games consoles can drop over time, such a slump is by no means the norm.

For example, the PlayStation 4, which was launched in most regions in November 2013, sold 4.1 million units between January and March 2016, while after the launch of the PS4 Slim, sales even increased to 7 million units in the following year. Sony has sold a total of 93.7 million PS5s to date, while the PlayStation 4 sold 97 million units in the same period after its launch. As the most recent price increase only came into effect in April, the effects of the $100 increase in the list price will only become apparent in the future.