Switch Best selling | Top Software 2020 (Phy + Digital)

Highlights –

211.9 million games were sold across UK & Ireland, mainland Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) in 2020, according to sales tracker GSD.
FIFA 21 was No.1 in almost every market bar Finland, where the top seller was NHL 21
The biggest publisher of boxed games across Europe was Nintendo, with a market share of over 28%, more than double EA in second place. In terms of digital, Ubisoft is No.1 with a nearly 18% market share, again ahead of EA in second place.

Digital –
In terms of consoles, PS4 was the biggest platform for downloads across the tracked publishers, accounting for 52% of sales — PC was in second place with 27%. It’s worth noting that the majority of the publishers that are sharing digital sales are primarily known for their console releases. It’s also worth noting that Game Pass sales are not included with this data.

In order to get a more accurate reading of the market share between boxed and digital, we have to remove countries that do not count both boxed and digital sales. We also have to subtract companies like Nintendo, Bethesda and CD Projekt, who do not share digital numbers with GSD. After doing that, we can see that 59% of games sold by tracked publishers were downloaded, with the remainder coming via physical sales. In 2019, less than 48% of sales were digital.

Retail –
PS4 at the top with a 43% market share, although it is only narrowly ahead of Nintendo Switch, which has a 41% market share. This does vary across the continent. In France and Germany, Switch is the top performing console for boxed game sales, whereas PS4 is strong in Italy and Spain.

Hardware –
Nintendo’s console spiked in sales by more than 22% over the same period a year before. It sold almost three times as much as the second best-selling device: PS4, sales of which dropped 42% over 2019, which isn’t too surprising when you consider the next PlayStation was released in November. PS5 was the third best-selling console of the year, followed by the Xbox Series machines (including both S and X iterations) and then Xbox One.

Switch dominated European sales, except in the Nordic region. In Denmark and Finland, PS4 was the best-selling console, while in Sweden PS5 was the most popular device.

Accessories
DualShock 4 controller, which is of little surprise considering the popularity of the PS4 across the regions.

GSD Annual 2020 Top 20 Video Games (Digital + Physical)

1 FIFA 21 (EA)
2 Grand Theft Auto 5 (Rockstar)
3 Animal Crossing: New Horizons (Nintendo)*
4 FIFA 20 (EA)
5 Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War (Activision Blizzard)
6 Mario Kart 8: Deluxe (Nintendo)*
7 The Last of Us Part 2 (Sony)
8 The Last of Us Part 2 (Sony)
9 Assassin’s Creed Valhalla (Ubisoft)
10 Red Dead Redemption 2 (Rockstar)
11 NBA 2K20 (2K Games)
12 Super Mario 3D All-Stars (Nintendo)*
13 Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege (Ubisoft)
14 Cyberpunk 2077 (CD Projekt)*
15 Minecraft: Switch Edition (Nintendo/Microsoft)*
16 Ghost of Tsushima (Sony)
17 Assassin’s Creed Odyssey (Ubisoft)
18 Ring Fit Adventure (Nintendo)
19 Just Dance 2020
20 Super Mario Party (Nintendo)*
*Digital data not available

GSD European Digital 2020 Top 10 Video Games (excluding UK)

1 FIFA 21 (EA)
2 Grand Theft Auto 5 (Rockstar)
3 FIFA 20 (EA)
4 Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War (Activision Blizzard)
5 NBA 2K20 (2K Games)
6 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (Activision Blizzard)
7 Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Siege (Ubisoft)
8 Red Dead Redemption 2 (Rockstar)
9 Assassin’s Creed Odyssey (Ubisoft)
10 Assassin’s Creed Valhalla (Ubisoft)

GSD European Physical 2020 Top 10 Video Games (excluding UK)

1 FIFA 21 (EA)
2 Animal Crossing: New Horizons (Nintendo)
3 Mario Kart 8: Deluxe (Nintendo)
4 The Last of Us: Part 2 (Sony)
5 Super Mario 3D All-Stars (Nintendo)
6 Grand Theft Auto 5 (Rockstar)
7 Assassin’s Creed Valhalla (Ubisoft)
8 FIFA 20 (EA)
9 Cyberpunk 2077 (CD Projekt)
10 Minecraft: Switch Edition (Nintendo)