EA Sports College Football 25 boosted all gaming sales | Circana July 2024

After months of Helldivers II holding the top spot on 2024’s best-seller list, EA Sports College Football 25 has stolen its throne, according to industry-tracking firm Circana. Not only has the game sold well enough to put it atop the July charts, but it’s also apparently responsible for an upturn in total video game sales for the month. Unlike in previous months, the numbers for every single category of game sales are up year-over-year.

“Video game content spending increased 10% in July compared to a year ago, as 29% growth in console content spending and an 8% increase in mobile was partially offset by a 6% drop in spending on PC, cloud and non-console VR content,” said Mat Piscatella, Circana’s executive producer for games reports. “EA Sports College Football 25 debuted as the best-selling game of 2024 year-to-date and was the primary driver of both content and hardware growth on console platforms.”

According to Circana’s past reports, July is the first month of 2024 so far to show growth in the hardware category. Piscatella added, with regards to hardware sales, “Growth in spending on PlayStation 5 (+25% vs YA) and Xbox Series (+48%) hardware was partially offset by a 44% drop in spending on Switch.” It should be noted that EA Sports College Football 25 is only available on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S.

Circana July 2024: Top 20 best-selling games in the U.S.

As noted, EA Sports College Football 25 is the best-selling title for the month, but it also holds the second place as well. The EA Sports MVP Bundle includes both EA Sports College Football 25 Deluxe Edition as well as Madden NFL 25 Deluxe Edition.

The game’s popularity was evident even at its launch, as EA said in a statement that 2.2 million unique players played the game during its early access period, available for Deluxe Edition players three days before launch. EA CEO Andrew Wilson praised the game’s performance in an analyst call, saying, “This is a monumental moment for EA Sports.”

The only other new release to make the best-sellers list is Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition. It’s always notable when a new Nintendo title makes the Circana best-seller list, if only because Nintendo doesn’t provide its digital sales data to Circana to factor into its analysis.

Tekken 8 and The Crew: Motorfest benefit from sales

Two of the games that have made a return to Circana’s top 20 from lower spots are The Crew: Motorfest and Tekken 8. The two titles have moved from 37 to 19 and 30 to 14, respectively. The reason for both games’ rise appears to be a combination of summer sales and new content updates. Motorfest rolled out its Season 4 content, which added new cars and the “Donk vs Lowrider” playlist. The game was also available to play for free on all platforms between July 4-11.

Tekken 8 was part of multiple summer sales, including the PlayStation Summer Sales event and Steam’s summer sale. Walmart and Best Buy also offered deals on the console editions of the games. As for content, Bandai Namco rolled out several new features for the game in July’s 1.06 update, as well as roster addition Lidia Sobieska.

Circana July 2024: 20 best-selling games of 2024 so far

Both EA Sports College Football 25 and the EA Sports MVP Bundle have joined the top-sellers of 2024 list, with the former knocking Helldivers II off the top spot for the first time since it launched in February. Elden Ring is maintaining a steady place on the list, despite most other games getting shifted by the two new titles — possibly due to the lingering effects of Shadow of the Erdtree.