PS4 Ships 100 Million Units Worldwide

The PlayStation 4 has reached a huge milestone. According to Sony’s latest earnings report, the console shipped 3.2 million units worldwide during the first quarter of the fiscal year 2019, up from the 2.6 million it moved during the final quarter of FY2018. When combined with the 96.8 million units the system had sold as of this past April, that brings its global lifetime numbers up to a staggering 100 million.

According to video game analyst Daniel Ahmad, the PS4 has now become the fastest console to hit the 100 million mark, surpassing both the PS2 and Nintendo’s Wii. It took the PS2 five years and nine month to reach that milestone, while the PS4 was able to do so in five years and seven months. Sony expects to sell 15 million PS4 systems this fiscal year, which would bring console up to 111.8 million units by March 31, 2020.

Hardware wasn’t the only milestone Sony surpassed. In the same earnings report, the company revealed that digital purchases of full PS4 games during this past quarter hit 53%, the first time more players had purchased digital copies of games over physical ones. Meanwhile, PlayStation Plus reached 36.2 million subscribers–up year-over-year from the 33.9 million it had in the first quarter of FY2018.

These are especially impressive results considering the PS4 is entering its seventh year on the market, and its successor, the PS5, is looming on the horizon. While the next-generation console isn’t expected to launch until at least 2020, Sony has already begun revealing tidbits of information about it. The company has already confirmed it will be backwards compatible with PS4 games, and we know the system will still have a disc drive and use a solid state drive.

While PS5 may be approaching, there are still a few major releases in store for the PS4. Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima’s enigmatic Death Stranding launches on November 8, while the highly anticipated Final Fantasy VII Remake arrives on March 3, 2020. The Last of Us: Part II is also on the way. While it doesn’t yet have a concrete release date, Ellie actress Ashley Johnson teased it could be launching in February 2020.

from GameSpot – Game News https://www.gamespot.com/articles/ps4-ships-100-million-units-worldwide/1100-6468760/