PlayStation Q1 earnings hit $1 billion, best in the history of gaming

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Sony's PlayStation brand made more Q1 revenues than any company in the history of video games.

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Today Sony announced its Q1'20 financials and broke a number of records in the process. The PlayStation division made over $1 billion in profits on $5.63 billion in total revenues, becoming the top Q1 earner in the decades-long history of gaming. This is also the first time Sony's gaming branch made over $1 billion in a quarter.

PlayStation pulled in 48% of Sony's total company profits ($2.17 billion) during the period. This is the best operating profit for PlayStation of any quarter ever. PlayStation revenues like software, which spiked tremendously, helped drive Sony's Q1 profits by over 50% year-over-year.

PlayStation's Q1'20 revenues are higher than all of Xbox's historical quarterly gaming earnings, even those in the holiday period, and are a historical high for Q1 PlayStation earnings.

Gaming also accounted for nearly 31% of Sony's total quarterly revenues, up 7 percentage points from Q1'19.

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Sony Q1'20 Total Earnings

• Net Sales - $18.3 billion, up 2.2% YoY
• Operating Profit -$2.12 billion, -1.1% YoY
• Net Profit - $2.17 billion, up 53.4% YoY

PlayStation (Games & Network Services) Total Earnings

• Net Sales - $5.63 billion
• Net Profit - $1.152 billion

Sony owes this massive surge in earnings to digital, which skyrocketed due to COVID-19 lockdowns. Sony's digital game earnings are up 82.7% to $3.67 billion (yes, $3.67 billion in one quarter).

Hardware is down 45% to $945.16 million, and Sony moved 1.9 million PlayStation 4 consoles during Q1'20. The total PS4 cumulative worldwide shipments sit at 112.3 million.

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Sony Games and Network Services Earnings Breakdown

• Digital Software - $3,670 million, up 82.7% YoY
• Physical Software - $352 million, up 49.3% YoY
• Hardware - $517 million, down 45.3% YoY
• Network Services - $867 million, up 11.6% YoY
• Other - $230 million, down 20.1% YoY

Sony's total-year forecast for FY2020 will likewise break gaming records. The company expects PlayStation to make $23.4 billion in revenues and $2.24 billion in profits on the backs of continued PlayStation 4 hardware and software sales, and the introduction of its next-gen PlayStation 5 console.

This would be the biggest all-time yearly revenues that any games company has ever earned.

Big thanks to ResetERA's ArmGunar for these data sets.