Video game console sales in the US have seen their worst November in 30 years, as Call Of Duty: Black Ops 7 tops the software chart.
Based on early sales figures and weird apologetic statements from Activision, it’s clear Call Of Duty: Black Ops 7 has failed to live up to the franchise’s usual juggernaut success.
Developed by Treyarch and Raven Software, Black Ops 7 launched on November 14, 2025 into a more competitive shooter market than usual – with Battlefield 6 and Arc Raiders both being released beforehand to a positive reception.
The impact of these titles, along with the generally negative perception around Black Ops 7, has been laid out in the US sales charts for November – even if everything seems hunky dory on the surface.
In US chart data released by Circana, Black Ops 7 topped the US chart in November, based on dollar sales, across physical and digital. This is the 18th consecutive year a Call Of Duty game has been the best-selling title in its launch month.
That might sound like business as usual, but it’s a murkier picture once you look into it. Despite topping the chart for November, Black Ops 7 debuted as the seventh best-selling game of 2025 so far, which is lower than usual for Call Of Duty titles.
According to Circana’s Mat Piscatella, Black Ops 7 saw a ‘double-digit percentage’ decline in dollar sales compared to Black Ops 6 in November 2024. Black Ops 6 did launch on October 25, 2024, so the numbers will be different, but it’s still a substantial drop.
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While Call Of Duty can afford to take a few financial knocks, Activision will be most troubled by the fact Battlefield 6 is currently the best-selling game of 2025 – so EA’s shooter has clearly eaten into Call Of Duty’s audience.
The big question is whether this decline will continue when next year’s Call Of Duty rolls around, when there (presumably) won’t be another Battlefield to contend with. However, the next Call Of Duty will have to rival GTA 6 instead, so it might fare even worse.
Beyond Battlefield 6, the other best-selling games of the year so far include NBA 2K26, Monster Hunter Wilds, Borderlands 4, EA Sports College Football 26, and Madden NFL 26. Black Ops 7 is just ahead of its predecessor, Black Ops 6, on the list, so as usual for Call Of Duty, sales for the former will likely remain steady throughout 2026.
Elsewhere on the November chart, Kirby Air Riders and Hyrule Warriors: Age Of Imprisonment were the only other new entries at number 10 and 11, respectively. However, Nintendo doesn’t share digital figures, so these were likely a bit higher in reality.
On the hardware front, 1.6 million units were sold across all platforms in November, for a total spend of $695 million (£519 million). Worringly, this is a 27% drop from last year, and the lowest total for a November month since the $455 million (339 million) spent in 1995.
PlayStation 5 was the best-selling console of the month, with significant discounts during Black Friday giving it a major boost in November. But even then it was still down 40% compared to the year prior.
The Nintendo Switch 2 is the second best seller but, as reported by IGN, Switch and Switch 2 combined sales were down over 10% from Switch sales last year.
The Xbox Series X/S ranked third in dollar sales (it was beaten by the NEX Playground in terms of units sold), but these numbers saw a massive drop of 70% year-over-year.
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The figures for the Switch 2 are particularly surprising considering the console only launched in June this year, and quickly became the fastest-selling console ever. The downturn in November suggests either many people bought Switch 2’s early on, or less people overall are buying video game consoles as Christmas gifts in light of rising costs.
The cheap price of the PlayStation 5 almost certainly had an effect on buying intentions for the Switch 2, since during November the Digital Edition was close to half the price of Nintendo’s new console.
Either way, it’s not a promising sign for the next Xbox or PlayStation 6, which will inevitably be even more expensive when they arrive in the next couple of years.
While hardware sales fell to a dramatic low, things were better on the content side, albeit marginally. Video game content spending grew by 1% compared to a year ago, hitting $4.8 billion (£3.5 billion). This was mainly driven by a 16% increase in subscription spending and a 2% growth in mobile, which offset declines in console and PC spending.
However, physical software sales dropped 14% year-over-year for the worst November since 1995, the year when Circana began tracking data.
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