According to a recent analysis conducted by Ampere Analysis’ Piers Harding-Rolls, subscription services such as the likes of Xbox Game Pass and PS Plus only account for a very small slice of the total revenue generated by the games industry.
As revealed in the analysis (reported by Axios), subscription services collectively generate around $3.7 billion in the North American and European markets, which only accounts for 4% of the total spending of $81 billion on game discs, downloads, DLC, microtransactions, and so on. This is in sharp contrast to the music industry, where subscription services like Spotify collectively account for 83% of the total revenue generated by the medium.
As it stands, Xbox Game Pass is clearly leading the charge with market share of around 60% and a subscriber base of 25 million and counting. Now that Sony has announced its revamped PS Plus offerings, it will be interesting to see how this picture looks a couple of years from now. Either way, suffice to say, it’s still a long road before subscription services become a majority stakeholder in the gaming market.