The future gaming industry will prefer two consoles Intelligence DFC

Not only will the gaming industry grow in the next few years, but it will see shifts in the hardware market, he said Intelligence DFC – with only two clear winners among the three major manufacturers. The research and consulting firm released its annual report and market outlook today, and one of its most important findings is that consumers will only have room in their wallets for two new gaming devices, while a third will struggle to find its place.

Previous DFC reports indicate that 2025 will usher in a period of record growth for the gaming industry, and the Markets Report explains this in detail: The industry is expected to recover from the decline seen in previous years, thanks in part to the launch of exciting new games and consoles. Two of the biggest and most pressing ones are Nintendo’s new console and Grand Theft Auto VI, both of which are expected to debut in 2025.

The report also shows that the gaming audience will grow along with the market itself. By 2027, the DFC expects the number of gamers to reach 4 billion, up from approximately 3.8 billion today. Most of these 4 billion gamers will be “low revenue” players, meaning they won’t spend a lot of money on games. Conversely, the top 10% of spenders in the gaming community will account for 65% of video game revenue in the next few years, according to the report.

Two consoles are winners for the next few years

Besides the growth in the number of players, DFC also predicts the state of the hardware market over the next few years. Nintendo’s new console will be a major driver of growth, and the report notes that it will have a stronger launch than the Switch, and many households may buy multiple devices. This will be part of a larger hardware spending trend — DFC expects hardware revenue spending to reach $120 billion in 2028.

However, not every console will enjoy the Nintendo treatment, the report says. It’s possible that both Sony and Microsoft will release a new console between now and 2028, but only one is expected to succeed. Since the next PlayStation and Xbox consoles are entirely theoretical at this point, there’s no way to know which one will be a success. This will depend on the features of the new consoles and the active install base.

In addition to hardware sales, the report also predicts shifts in gaming revenue over the next few years. Add-on content and subscription revenues will continue to outpace full-game revenues, with single-game subscriptions (such as MMOs) outpacing those that offer multiple games (such as Xbox Game Pass). Distribution will be one of the biggest challenges facing gaming companies.

“Over the past three decades, the video game industry has grown more than 20-fold, and after two years of declining hardware and software sales, it is poised to resume growth at a healthy rate through the end of the decade,” David Cole, CEO and founder of DFC Intelligence, said in a statement. Although 2025 will mark the beginning of this upward trajectory, there are still some huge questions, including who will lose the next-gen console war and who will win the game software distribution battle and with major publishers focusing on streaming services around evergreen franchises, the opportunities will be high For small studios it is abundant.