PS3 expected to overtake the 360

November 22, 2010 By Ryan Fleming

New projections show that within the next year, the PlayStation 3 will have sold more units worldwide than the Xbox 360.

Although Nintendo is sitting on the top of the console sales heap, perched high on the shoulders of the Wii’s 76 million units sold, the battle for second place is still hotly contested. Currently, the Xbox 360 has a firm grasp on the number 2 spot with 45.2 million units sold worldwide, and that number is expected to increase this holiday thanks to the success of the Kinect– which sold over 1 million units in 10 days. Projections have Microsoft selling 5 million Kinect units in total this holiday season, many of which will be part of a bundle, so the 360 is expected to do well this quarter. But nipping on the 360’s heels is the PlayStation 3, which has sold 41.2 million units worldwide. It is a tight battle, but as anyone that follows electronic sales can tell you, it is a marathon, not a sprint–and it appears that Sony might be making its move.

According to the analyst group DFC Intelligence, the PS3 will surpass the Xbox 360 in consoles sold worldwide, sometime in 2011. The Xbox 360 has been exceeding projections in consoles sold, and despite slumping software figures, hardware sales for Microsoft have been well ahead of projections. The above average sales numbers should continue through the holiday season, but that trend is likely to end shortly after.

Although the sales of the 360 console have been very strong following the redesign of the console, the software sales have not been rising to match. This suggests that many of the new systems sold are either replacement units, or are part of multiple consoles in the same house. And while the 360 may have fan base that is loyal—or has become too invested to not replace a dead console—the PS3 seems to be attracting new fans at a steady pace. The PS3 still trails the 360, but it was released almost an entire year after and the sales numbers continue to improve year to year.

Sony also has a huge advantage over Microsoft in the Japanese market. Nintendo dominates overseas as well as in Europe and the Americas, but while the PS3 has sold nearly 6 million units in Japan, a number that is expected to increase this holiday thanks to lower prices, Microsoft has never really been able to make an impact with the original Xbox or the Xbox 360. Current figures show a mere 1.4 million 360s sold in Japan, and while that number might increase thanks to the Kinect, Microsoft is not gaining much ground. By comparison, the 360 has sold 25.9 million in the Americas, while the PS3 has moved 16.1 million. The PS3 has a very slight edge in Europe though, with 19.4 million; the 360 has sold 17.8 million, and could narrow that gap this holiday season.

While the PlayStation Move might not have had the impact Sony was hoping, DFC is suggesting that a huge plate of exclusive titles could further boost the PS3’s sales in 2011. Games like Killzone 3, LittleBigPlanet 2, and SOCOM 4 are all due out as PS3 exclusives in the next year. With the PS3 finally turning a profit on each console sold, it has been able to lower the price of the system.

Of course, these are all just projections, and anything can happen, but it could be the year of the PS3.

Showing 30 comments

festa at 1:38am 15th January 2011 ...........none profit for sony and the game companys that develope it now pay for the game and ya blue ray goes,the biggest fault i have found with ps3's is the blue-ray and it aint cheap to replace xbox 360 sinple RROD easy to fix a few quid and the right eqipment done last for ever if done correctly.........hd drive on xbox 360 are none transferable..so you get a new drive the as the one you got and change its motherboard with the original done not a problem........ps3 still got to buy that blue - ray wich faults more times than an xbox will........YLOD......just as common so the two are great though i agree the ps3 graghics are better and as for the kinect there are more familys than hard core gamers so it is gunna do well,and as for the Wii i had one never broke down but damn did it get boring so it's sold so as a repairer of the systems they aint no differant they both mess as much as each other but the xbox 360 is far cheaper to fix..
festa at 1:38am 15th January 2011 ??.....if a hd game costs 45 to 47 a time imagine the price of a game in blue-ray ,imagine the size of the game world you will have in the games,imagine the ghraghic power you will have the thought of this is endless.....now imagine the price for such a game..........they wouldnt make a penny on it this is why they dont make blue-ray games the engines that would they have to develope for such a game world nobody thought of this the game would be out of reach for the average hardcore gamer only the rich well off would be able to get it
festa at 1:37am 15th January 2011 i repair 360's and ps3's they have both got a high breakdown rate but the ps3 isnt heard about as often. as for games who gives a damn my kids love them both. the wand what a joke they bought nintedos pattern and copied it how that for imagination. the blue ray you all keep banging on about wait till it breaks down and the games
Xbox Sucks at 5:54am 5th January 2011 who wants to pet a emaginary tiger anyway
Guest at 6:46am 22nd December 2010 Ps3 is so much better. It is a great DVD player, and a Blue Ray player. it can used as a media server to connect up with other Sony devices to watch videos or music In every room in your house. connect it to the psp and you can transfer movies between the two devices, and use the psp to control the ps3 remotely and watch movies on your psp from your ps3 via the Internet. Some games you can use the psp as a remote to play a game on the ps3. My ps3 can play super audio CD's which the xbox cannot, and play any game bought in any country and has backward compatiblity with ps2 and ps games. My ps3 is an original and has had no problems. Better all around than the xbox which I had, but sold many years ago....
CriticalX at 2:23pm 21st December 2010 kinect is not new technology and for those who saying the ps3 made a wii knockoff, remember the Eyetoy already did motion capture long before kinect. though released in 2003, the technology in gaming was nearly 10 years before kinect! the ps3 will survive much longer, because it offers what the 360 can't and have already announced, never will. Bluray. Blu-ray will replace dvds, therefore leaving the ps3's value to last much longer due to it also being a game console as well as having an internet browser. you pretty much get an extremely powerful pc at a fraction of the price. and alot of PC titles are coming to console now. another thing, is the ability to upgrade. Sony made it as easy as popping open a little piece of plastic, unscrewing the harddrive, pulling it out, and replacing it with a new one. the 360, although yes it can be replaced, is much more time consuming, and too much of a hassle since you a have to deal with connecting a new hdd to your computer, installing some software on it, unscrewing the enclosure it comes in, screwing it back together, and just hope that you did everything right so you dont have to do it all over again. plus the ps3 interface is just much more sleek and modern. its a thing of beauty. oh yea, and i own every console to date, even an intellivision! i do play my wii, ps3, and 360 regularly.
A_Blind_Witness at 9:44pm 19th December 2010 LMFAO wowwwww, really? did any really point out the TRUE potential of a ps3 over xbox? xbox has a limit of what they can really play because of limited space on their disc. they rushed it out and went with HD movies(which they needed an external drive for this) and their already obsolete! this was just 4-5 years ago. playstation waited it out and went with blu-ray which wasnt to popular because of the price, but...(wait for it)....whos on the market still ?! 8.5GBs on a DVD dl, while its 50 GBs on a BD dl. i dont think any game has come close to completely taking advantage of it yet and it's still one upping the 360 on graphics, game length, 3D, etc, etc. as said before "history is repeating itself" because it is. i see the 360 being obsolete within 2 years, the ps3 will still just be starting on the greatest games yet to come. i own both systems, i love my playstation all the way around, and people may hate me for this but the only thing their doing wrong is not charging for online. the 360's online is amazing, but their also pulling money out their ass from gamer's spending $60 for a year subscription, then they put atleast half of it towards their servers. look at the exclusives, when was the last time an xbox360 game got a perfect 10 in gameinformer, i can't recall any from 2010. look at playstation exclusives, there was quite a few, heavy rain, god of war 3, uncharted 2, etc, etc 360s have plenty of problems, which in time, cause more sales, because people dont want their money wasted through dlc which they havnt noticed that the real money saver is a PS3. if it wernt for halo 3, halo reach, left4dead, left4dead 2, and too human (which personally i think is a knock off of god of war, just in a future setting)
360 at 5:26pm 12th December 2010 Well in november the ps3 certainly didnt start overtaking the xbox. 6 hundred thousand ps3s to 1.3 million xboxes is awful. Oh well maybe they will never overtake the xbox. Besides ps3 exclusives are not any better except for uncharted which still didnt outsell halo reach.
BrainyM at 11:05am 2nd December 2010 Just commenting on the failure rate, i have always been into the playstation back in the ps1 days....then i purchased the xbox 1 and it was ok (as in it never failed). So when the 360 came out i purchased it because of Halo......then i stopped playing for a few months because of studying. One day i switched it on and i got the red circle of death. I actually handled my 360 like gold but it treated me back like dirt.....so say no more.....i will be changing to PS3 for sure.
Philippe at 1:10pm 26th November 2010 hahah hilarious,, I still play super nintendo maximum carnage,, spider man and venom,, its the sh*t,, 2D all the way,, nothing better then being high playin on a simple screen nothing fancy,,,, you wanna spend money on games I suggest you buy some jordans,,,, WE OUT CHEA!!! , lil boosie goes hard,, !! WHY,,, cuz he never forgot tupac,scarface,, the real gs that lived the G code... hahahah hey litle wayne fans,,, hows the ps3.. probly spend more time gamin and jerkin it, then actually hustlin,,, .. ... short bus short bus shot bus shorty,, thats retarded swag shorty.
Tom Ato at 2:41pm 25th November 2010 The PS3 has award - winning GOTY - quality games like Uncharted 2. The 360 only has second - rate garbage like Galo or Flopza. Xbox 360 games are not good enough to win awards and the VGA's proved that. If you want quality - you buy a PS3, if you want hand - me - down knock - offs you get a 360, simple as that. PS3 has better exclusive games, better graphics, better online, better controller, sterescopic 3D support on over 50 titles planned for next year and Blu - Ray. Xbox 360 has nothing except low - quality Halo spin - offs like Halo Wars. There is absolutely no reason anybody would want to buy a 360.
yoshi at 9:22pm 24th November 2010 all i gotta say is ps3 has a huge range of game choices from fps to rpg, karaoke to eyepets for the little ones. i just can't wait for killzone 3, resistance 3 and uncharted 3!!! not forgetting gran turismo, little big planet 2 and new ico game. woot. ps3 all the way baby!
doa766 at 4:40pm 24th November 2010 in a race where the participans start a different times what matters is who gets there faster, not who gets there first, like in Rally the PS3 already overtook the 360 since the gap in sales is a lot smaller than the number of 360s sold before the PS3 was released
Kinect rulzz at 4:27pm 24th November 2010 Yea because the ps3 they not buy that sh*t for the gaming they are buying in it for the sh*t bluray
jaa at 4:13pm 24th November 2010 well said white guy
Plgamer90 at 11:21am 23rd November 2010 oh yea, haha "It does everything." Make. Believe.
1. White Guy at 1:52pm 23rd November 2010 Wow y'all will make.beieve everything is more like it. The PS3 isn't even fully untapped. Y'all paid for a pre-teen version of Jenna Jameson. You'll be buying another PS3's before they even come close to tapping it's full potential. Informed Buyer Fail! So how is Sony's Wii knock-off doing?? Yea their whole BD-R idea is still not taking off completely either. And it will take another 5-8 years to get a decent library of "True" Blu-Ray movies(actually mastered on BD-R not some revamp junk version). PS: How can Microsoft run out of titles when every techie interested in the kinect will innovate a way of utilizing. Not to mention the Kinect could open doors to robotic surgery! I know maybe PS3 owners can use the move as an enima!
Plgamer90 at 11:13am 23rd November 2010 The anticipation is once again brewing, and Sony in my opinion still has the creativity nature in the bag with games such as Little Big Planet 1 and 2. I mean the possibilities are greater with the Playstation 3. And when you think of all that you get with the Playstation 3, its no wonder that it will probably win 2011 and beyond. Playsation Move may not seem a new concept, but it sure is better then the Wii. And dont get me wrong I think that Kinect is one awesome invention. However, it just doesnt seem very focused on a "gamers" outlook. Its more focused on family, again something that might not be very appealing. Games for the Playstation Move may be slim right now, however could this once again be Sony's plan to expand the Playstation's life cycle? But really think about it, The ps3 is an amazing game console with free playstation network, its a blu ray player, it brings a better picture for HD movies with HDTVs, its got more exclusives for 2011, it has Playstation Move, it has 3d games and looks awesome on the Sony Bravia, and Sony has always and still will have more sales in Japan and Europe. Its a Sony product, its a Playstation 3! History is going to repeat itself!
Plgamer90 at 11:12am 23rd November 2010 In my opinion Sony is just better at marketing their products. Although it was expensive when it first came out, the anticipation of getting it was still high, so people still bought it. And it still has that anticpation because it simply is a playstation product. Sony has always had the competitive edge over its competitors, like the gamecube and xbox in the past. The playstation 2 had a 10 year life cycle and its still getting new titles today!! I believe that history is repeating itself. Nintendo is still trumping both consoles, however its also running out of titles. Microsoft is also running out of titles compared to the Playstation 3, and this may be the fall in its plan overall. Sony has another great line up for 2011 with many exclusives that Playstation 2 gamers are still waiting for such as killzone 3, and Twisted Metal. Not to mention GT5 fans are getting to get a treat this holiday season!! So that game alone is definitely going to sell games!!
360 at 9:18am 23rd November 2010 Man you guys love the ps3!!! i own both the xbox and ps3 and they're both amazing ps3 has better graphices xbox has better online. Uncharted 2 was awesome! so was halo reach! they are both great but niether one is better. and i think that at the end of 2011 the xbox will still be ahead just wait. we will see who is right
eric at 9:02am 23rd November 2010 if you want to know why the ps3 is better then the xbox just click on the link an read whats coming up for the ps3 http://www.videogamer.com/news/sony_has_holograph...
osiris at 6:30am 23rd November 2010 nothing to say..ps3 its better. Uncharted 2 say it all. Blue ray. 3D. MOVE. etc.etc
Jowga Lee at 1:30am 23rd November 2010 PS3 Baby!!!!!
Tracker at 10:15pm 22nd November 2010 Agreed, talking about the PS3 "catching up" to xbox in sales is like talking about the TV catching up to the radio in sales. How many years did we have radios before the tv was invented? O.O Or how about when they release the xbox 720 (hey they went from xbox1 to xbox360, so who knows), and people compare the sales of it to the sales of the Super Nintendo...the comparison is old and stupid. I've sold more heebieharbies then MS has! Woot! No no, nevermind that they don't make them, I've still done it! The fact that Sony has already closed such a large gap when MS had a huge headstart says it all.
rick at 7:30pm 22nd November 2010 Michael, i love you. i couldn't have said it any better. With over 1 million banned/modded xbox's, Broken consoles, and multiple console purchases (i know people that bought over 5 xbox's, retards) it's no question that Ps3 has already past xbox 360 in TRUE INSTALL BASE, not just "consoles sold". it'll just be "official" once the Ps3 surpasses the 360 in consoles shipped and sold. and @360: you're and idiot. People have been saying that Ps3 will "Shine this year" ever since 2008 (remember the whole Year-of-the-Ps3 thing?) and every year since, and honestly since 2008 the Ps3 seriously has been doing better than the 360 every year. You're getting it confused. Analysts have always said years back that the Ps3 won't overtake the Xbox until 2011/2012 and looks to me like everything's going along just the way people said it will be, the Ps3 outshining the xbox every year and will overtake it in sales in 2011/2012.
1. 360 at 12:42pm 4th February 2012 The ps3 didnt catch up in 2011. Instead it got farther behind.
Michael at 7:09pm 22nd November 2010 It already has overtaken 360.. Line up release dates (take away 360's 1-2 year head start where PS3 didn't exist and it is already selling better/more than 360 did at the same time from its release.. that plus the fact that many 360 owners have bought many 360s because of failure rates.. 360 is a joke.. PS3 is superior in every way possible. Once PS3 does surpass the 360 in total world wide sales it will be even more laughable.. because it doesn't mean PS3 caught up, it means PS3 sold so many more than 360 that they did so even with 360's 1-2 years head start.
1. Mark at 4:17pm 12th January 2011 Putting up a strong fight! Many 360 owners have bought new machines because they have failed. But why buy a new machine? I'll tell you.... Because they are phenomenal. I must of been one of the lucky ones that didn't ever have a machine break down on me. Upgrading as newer processors/chipset have been released, I am on my 3rd 360. The online function blows the PS3 away. It would take much more funding for them to compete in that area. Microsoft have done well to charge for "LIVE". The resolution; At first I found many games at a max resolution of 1080i. Now I find that most at outputting at full 1080p. Only the very few and top title PS3 games are at 1080p. Whats going on there? However I have heard rumours that developers are downscaling future title for the Xbox. I cant say how much truth there is in that statement. Now personally, I find the control pad easier to hold for longer periods of time. Since I now have the latest 'slim' I cant say much about the noise it make because in PS3's defence it made a terrible sound (not a bad as PS1). Now the good bit. I am fond of the PS3. I have the limited version they did with the 160gb HD. I bought it for the simple fact that I wanted to play the games that were not ever going to be available on the Xbox .I have still got my PS1& PS2 and will never give them up. I love 'Sixaxis', making Sackboy nod was quite amusing. I love the bluetooth on it. It makes typing and internet features much easier when connected to my mouse and keyboard. I love the fact that it suck the discs in instead of running the risk of scratching them by placing them on a tray (flat or vertical). Last but not least, I love Blu-ray!!! DVD-HD failed horrendously! I just glad thats one investment I never made. Not only that...this is where I think Sony could do with pulling a finger or two out. Blu-ray discs can hold much more information. Why has there not been a MASSIVE game? Something similar to MAG where other players affect the outcome of your person game. Come'on, such a long wait for GT5..... Forza 3 ripped it! Review came from a dedicated gamer from all formats going back as far as the C64. The End.
360 at 6:51pm 22nd November 2010 People say this every year!!! 2009 was going to be the year of the ps3 2010 was going to be it. Since it hasnt overtaken the xbox it will now be 2011. Wrong!! if it does happen it will be atleast 2012 or 13 i doubt it ever will though
what at 8:26pm 22nd November 2010 36o fingers my crusty hole real good