Summary
Microsoft has shared the list of 2024’s best-sellingXboxgames. As is customary for such year-end roundups, this particular list highlightsXboxgamers' strong preference for sports titles.
In late January 2024, Microsoft introduced a new initiative called the Xbox Excellence Awards. As the name suggests, the program aims to celebrate themost outstanding Xbox gameson an annual basis.
The first iteration of theXbox Excellence Awardscomprises four categories, one of which measures commercial performance. This category includes 20 games that sold the most units on the Microsoft/Xbox Store over the course of 2024. Microsoft decided to alphabetize this list rather than present it in the form of rankings, making it impossible to determine how individual titles stack up against one another from this source alone. But if Circana’s recently publishedreport on the top 20 best-selling games of 2024is any indication,Call of Duty: Black Ops 6andEA Sports College Football 25might have topped Microsoft’s sales charts last year.
Top 20 Best-Selling Microsoft/Xbox Store Games of 2024
Microsoft alphabetized the list of 2024’s best-selling games rather than sharing detailed rankings.
In terms of big-picture trends,sports gameshave dominated the Xbox ecosystem over the course of 2024. More than one-third of the newly shared list consists of sports titles, includingMLB The Show 24,NBA 2K25,NHL 25, andWWE 2K24. Three sports games from Electronic Arts have also made the cut. Of those,EA Sports College Football 25andEAS FC 25ended up making the top 20 in two other categories: Player Engagement and Daily Active Users. While the latter is self-explanatory, Microsoft measures player engagement by calculating the average playing hours per user within the first six weeks of a given game’s release.
Multiple Best-Selling Xbox Games of 2024 Underperformed Commercially
The newly released list of 2024’s best-selling Xbox games features several titles that underperformed commercially, making their inclusion somewhat unexpected. BothDragon Age: The VeilguardandStar Wars Outlawsfailed to meet internal sales expectations, with earlier signs suggesting thatAvatar: Frontiers of Pandorafaced similar challenges. Since all of them still sold well within the Xbox ecosystem, it’s debatable whether their perceived failures stem from unrealistic expectations, ballooning development budgets, other factors, or a combination thereof.
All the developers and publishers highlighted as part of the Xbox Excellence Awards 2024 will soon receive trophies from Microsoft. The full list of winners includes games from dozens of companies spanning 15 countries.
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