PlayStation earns $5.6 billion in Q3, makes 23% of Sony's earnings

Sony's latest quarterly earnings clearly show the generation is winding down for the PlayStation 5, but the drop isn't dramatic enough to significantly disrupt the PS4's current cycle.

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Throughout Sony's Q3'19 period, which runs from October - December 31, 2019, the company raked in $5.8 billion from overall Games and Network Service sales, a 20% drop from last year. Both hardware and software sales are down year-over-year too. Sony sold 6.2 million PS4s in the Holiday 2019 quarter, down 25% YoY, and a combined 81.1 million digital and physical PS4 games, down nearly 7% YoY.

These trends can be attributed to the absence of major heavy-hitting third-party games like the Q3 2018 launch of Red Dead Redemption 2, as well as the hardware market starting to peak.

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Read Also:PS4 shipments top 108.9 million, actual sales at 106 million

Other interesting tidbits to note is how services actually jumped 7% to $785.6 million, driven in part by strong PlayStation Plus premium subscriptions.

Sony confirms PS Plus subscribers now sit at 38.8 million, up 6.8% YoY. These numbers mean roughly 36% of all PlayStation 4 owners (106 million users in all) are subscribed to PlayStation Plus.

Gaming is still as important to Sony as ever, making up a significant portion of its overall fiscal year earnings. Games and Network Services made up 23.7% of Sony's total consolidated earnings for the nine-momth period ending December 31, 2019.

Sony expects PlayStation 4 sales to moderate throughout Q4 as it gears up for the PlayStation 5 in holiday 2020. The games-maker didn't discuss or reveal any key info about the PS5 during the presentation, and we still don't know when the console's reveal event will be held.

• Games and Network Services sales- $5.8 billion (632.1 billion yen), down 20% YoY
• Games and Network Services operating income- $489.99 million (53.3 billion yen), down 27% YoY
• PS4 hardware sales revenue - $1.36 billion (148.472 billion yen), down 33.5% YoY
• Physical software sales - $386.92 million (42.09 billion yen), down 49% YoY
• Digital game sales/DLC - $2.80 billion (304.982 billion yen), down 35% YoY
• Services revenue - $785.69 million (85.484 billion yen), up 7.1% YoY