Last month, November, was a shockingly terrible month for video game sales in the U.S. While we traditionally think of November as a huge sales month what with Black Friday and all, November 2025 was the worst November in video game hardware unit sales, and the worst in physical software dollar sales the U.S. has seen since 1995.
I mean Valve sells the Steam Deck(s)?
The steamdeck is physical software? I thought it was hardware with digital software.
Read it again:
I say this as someone who loves their Steam Deck… Steam Deck sales are insignificant compared to consoles.
6 million in 3 years:
https://birchtree.me/blog/steam-deck-sales-numbers-are-in-and-theyre-not-as-spectacular-as-id-hope-but-i-do-still-have-hope/
The Switch 2 has sold over 10 million, June to September. 3 months. There has been another 3 months since then.
https://variety.com/2025/digital/news/nintendo-switch-2-sales-10-million-1236569355/
No one said it was significant.
Of course, there’s a significant difference between the two, as a Switch 2 is the only way to play Switch 2 games, while you can play Steam games on a multitude of devices, including other portable ones.
And more significantly, the Switch 2 is for kids. There’s no sizable youth market for the Steam Deck.
But out of all the handheld PCs, the Steam Deck is #1, so that should give you some idea about the sales on the others. 😉
https://www.theverge.com/pc-gaming/618709/steam-deck-3-year-anniversary-handheld-gaming-shipments-idc