UK's top software (physical & digital) and hardware for May 2023 revealed

The stats for UK game and hardware have come in for May 2023, and Nintendo has once again come out the big winner.

First up, let’s take a look at the top 10 software titles in the UK for May 2023. Remember, any Nintendo titles featured in the top 10 only reflect their physical sales, as Nintendo doesn’t share digital numbers.

Along with that, we also have some details on the hardware side of things. Not surprisingly, Zelda helped the Switch retake the #1 console position once again. 96k units of hardware were sold in the month, with Switch leading the pack, albeit 5% down from April. This dip relates to the Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Switch OLED actually launching late in April, so the big sales burst started a month prior. That said, Switch sales in the UK were up 28% compared to May 2022.

As for the other hardware on the market, PS5 took second place with a dip of 23% month-on-month, while the Xbox brand came in third with a 10% drop compared to the month prior. Overall, console sales were up 16.6% so far in 2023 compared with the year before, with PS5 sales up 81%, Switch sales down 8% and Xbox Series S and X sales down 19%.

Finally, we have some various stats on hardware/software sales in the UK for May 2023 in general.

• almost 35% of all Switch consoles sold in May were the Zelda OLED version
• Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom was comfortably the No.1 game even without digital figures
• this was the biggest Zelda game launch in UK history
• game sales up nearly 30% compared with the same period last year, sitting at 2.17 million
• LEGO 2K Drive came in at No.19 for the month
• 441,268 accessories/peripherals were sold, down 9% over April and down 5% over May 2022
• the Switch Pro Controller was No.2 in accessories/peripherals
• the Zelda Switch Pro Controller reached No.20
• a Switch Carry Case tie-in with Zelda reached No.32 and sold out