Highlighting an ongoing development, the most well-liked video games on PlayStation and Xbox are multiplayer, on-line, live-service titles that are not essentially “new,” not less than not within the conventional sense.
Circana’s Mat Piscatella revealed that 2025’s high 5 most-played video games for PlayStation and Xbox within the US had been the identical as 2024’s, and within the case of PS5, the rating was precisely the identical.
On PS5, the highest 5 most-played video games within the US had been Fortnite, Name of Obligation, GTA V, Roblox, and Minecraft, ranked in that order. That was the identical as 2024, in line with Circana’s Participant Engagement Tracker, which is ranked by an “lively panel” of gamers.
On Xbox, the highest 5 most-played video games for 2025 within the US so as had been Fortnite, Name of Obligation, GTA V, Minecraft, and Roblox. For 2024, the rating went Name of Obligation, Fortnite, Minecraft, GTA V, after which Roblox.
Name of Obligation’s inclusion within the rating is buoyed by the truth that a number of video games are lumped into one single launcher. Presently, the launcher–COD HQ–includes the most recent sport, Black Ops 7, in addition to final 12 months’s Black Ops 6, together with the free-to-play juggernaut Name of Obligation: Warzone.
Piscatella mentioned the takeaway right here is that, “Issues are a bit established on the high.”
This report adopted on from a Newzoo research from 2024 that confirmed how 60% of playtime in video games for video games in 2023 had been attributable to video games greater than 5 years previous, together with Fortnite, GTA V, Name of Obligation, Roblox, and Minecraft.
Some have referred to those titles as “black gap” video games as a result of they suck up time, consideration, and cash to a major diploma, making it difficult for newcomers to seek out success.
Games like Fortnite, Minecraft, and Roblox might not be “new,” however they’re live-service video games that obtain new content material regularly, creating alternatives for folks to maintain coming again to play and spend cash. Throughout the Christmas vacation week within the US, one in three individuals who turned on their PlayStation or Xbox performed Fortnite.
(*5*)