While the Xbox Series consoles and the PS5 may have gotten the spotlight over the past few months, the Switch has continued to quietly break records. This morning, Nintendo posted their latest fiscal results and quite frankly, they are almost unbelievable. All results shown below are through calendar date December 31st, 2020.
First, with regard to hardware:
- The Switch has now sold through 79.87 million units. That is already higher than the lifetime sales of the 3DS.
- That includes 21.03 million units sold in 2020 alone, a 24% increase over the 16.95 million sold in 2019.
- It’s clear by now that the Switch will surpass the Wii’s lifetime sales (100+ million) eventually and thus make it the best-selling Nintendo console of all-time.
- This would make it the 2nd best selling console of all-time. It will be interesting to see how close it eventually gets to the PlayStation 2, and whether it can give it a run for its money.
However, it was the software sales which were even more impressive:
- Animal Crossing has now sold-through 31.18 million units. It is the only exclusive title to ever sell more than 30 million units in a calendar year.
- Given the Switch install base of just under 80 million, that represents an attach rate of nearly 40%.
- Mario Kart 8 Deluxe passed 33 million units.
- Mario Odyssey, Pokemon Sword&Shield, Zelda BoTW, and Super Smash Brothers Ultimate are all over 20 million units sold.
- Thus, six Nintendo first party titles have sold over 20 million units as exclusives.
Finally, this has translated to increased earnings for Nintendo as a company:
- Net sales were up 9% year over year.
- Operating profit increased 41.1% year over year.
- Net profit increased 33.3% year over year.
Our Take
It simply continues to amaze us at how well the Switch is performing. We’ve always said that combining the home and portable console markets was a brilliant idea by Nintendo, but that in combination with the pandemic has taken their success to new heights. As we always we say, we love to see it but we hope Nintendo is investing in hardware and online improvements for the future.