Report: Breath of the Wild Outsold Tears of the Kingdom Last Quarter, Switch Sales Reach 143 Million
Posted on August 02 2024 by Nick Miller
Nintendo’s new financial report for the first quarter of 2025 details updated sales figures for their hardware and software alike. While the ranking of the Switch’s top selling games remains unchanged from previous reports, one surprising detail can be found in the data: Breath of the Wild outsold Tears of the Kingdom this quarter by about 10,000 units.
Although it isn’t uncommon for sequels to sell worse than their predecessor — as Breath of the Wild has currently outsold Tears of the Kingdom by just over 11 million units — it is unusual for a game that’s just barely a year old to be outdone by a seven-year-old game from the same series in such a short time frame.
Declining sales could be the result of Tears of the Kingdom being a direct sequel that relies on fans having a knowledge of its predecessor to fully enjoy. Perhaps Breath of the Wild just has a broader appeal that we will more fully understand in hindsight. For now, however, fans can only speculate as to what caused Tears of the Kingdom‘s sales to decline so rapidly.
In other news, Switch hardware has now surpassed 143 million units sold. These sales numbers maintain the Switch as the third highest-selling video game console ever, behind the Nintendo DS’s 154 million — a figure the Switch will likely reach in its lifetime. This report shows, however, that year-on-year, the Switch has declined in sales by 46.3%, moving only 2.1 million units as opposed to the 3.91 million in quarter one of 2024. Nintendo attributes this peak and subsequent decline to last year’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie and the release of Tears of the Kingdom “energizing [their] dedicated video game platform business,” giving last year’s first quarter an irregular boost in interest. At this rate, however, Nintendo is falling short of this year’s 13.5 million unit sales goal.
So, what do you think? Why is Breath of the Wild outpacing Tears of the Kingdom‘s sales? Will Nintendo be able to reach this year’s hardware sales goals? What can Nintendo do to convince consumers to buy a Switch instead of waiting for next gen hardware? Let us know in the comments.
Source: Nintendo (1 ,2, 3) (via Nintendo Life)
Nick is a writer for Zelda Dungeon and a longtime fan of the Zelda franchise. In his free time, he enjoys fishing, archery, skateboarding, and some good ol’ fashioned family time. He’s an advocate for physical media and an avid video game collector. His favorite Zelda game is Ocarina of Time, though Breath of the Wild and the Link’s Awakening remake are close contenders. His other favorite video games series include Kingdom Hearts, Fallout, and Ratchet & Clank.
