PS2 officially surpasses 160m sales, retaining its best-selling console crown

Nintendo’s Switch might be nipping at its heels, but PlayStation 2 continues to hold the record as the best-selling console of all time – with Sony now confirming the machine has shifted a whopping 160m units since launching all the way back in March 2000.

This isn’t the first time we’ve heard that figure, of course; former PlayStation boss Jim Ryan casually claimed a total of 160m PlayStation 2s had been sold during a farewell edition of PlayStation Podcast earlier this year, but Sony has now updated its PlayStation history page to reflect that number, finally making it officially official.

PlayStation 2’s last major sales milestone was trumpeted back in 2011, when Sony revealed the console had surpassed 150m sales – although it only took another year for that number to jump up by a further 5m. So while sales have undoubtedly slowed – not exactly surprising seeing as Sony hasn’t produced a PS2 since January 2013 – the fact the console has successfully managed to shift another 5m units in the interim is still pretty wild.

To put that into some sort of perspective, PlayStation 5 is currently at 65m lifetime sales, while PS4 has sold 117m units, PS3 is at the 87m mark, and PS1 was snapped up by 102m Vib-Ribbon fans. Nintendo’s DS handheld almost came close to matching PS2’s previously announced figure, shifting 154m units, but it now trails someway behind. As for Switch (currently at 146m sales), it could still reign victorious if Switch 2 doesn’t get in its way.

For all this competitive chatter, 160m PS2s sold is still an impressive achievement, and you can read more about the console’s success elsewhere on Eurogamer. It’s not Sony’s only cause for celebration, of course, given the entire PlayStation brand is marking its 30th anniversary in exactly one week’s time. And all this because of a falling out with Nintendo.