Hardware Sales: USA Sees Worst November Since 1995

The month of November is considered one of the most important for market analysts, especially in the USA where the tradition of Black Friday is still very strong – and this despite the custom having spread to the rest of the world over the years, transforming from "a single day of super-discounts" into a broader period of various offers. In 2025, however, things did not go well at all, at least as far as the Console market is concerned.

Mat Piscatella of Circana reported the fact on BlueSky, detailing last month's sales figures: the total number of consoles sold during the period amounted to 1.6 Million units. Few. Too few, especially considering the arrival of Nintendo's new model, Switch 2, on shelves, which moreover is not even the best-selling product.

The winner's palm indeed goes to PS5, probably due to Sony's attractive discounts during the period, with price reductions of various models by as much as $100, whereas Nintendo refrained from an aggressive policy. And it is probably the issue of prices that deterred buyers from taking home a new console: Piscatella notes that the current average purchase price is around $440 and is 11% higher than last year; for comparison, in 2019 the average price was $235.

Nintendo Console Switch 2

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Rising Prices Halt Sales

The increase in prices, as we know, has various reasons, from the procurement costs of chips and memory due to the exponential growth of the AI market to the tariffs imposed by the Trump administration. The fact is that, for example, Xbox Series X was launched in 2020 at $500 but is now sold at $650. Most interestingly of all, to find a year in which fewer consoles were sold in the United States in November, one has to go back to 1995, when 1.4 million units were sold.

To mitigate the phenomenon, however, it must be considered that the Black Friday's little brother, Cyber Monday, due to calendar quirks, fell on December 1st this year, and therefore sales made on that particular day were not counted. Nevertheless, even making hypotheses and projections for that day, the overall picture is rather worrying.

Is this a symptom that the American economy is going through a critical period? "Correlation does not automatically imply causation... except when it does," Piscatella cryptically comments...