Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Is the Best-Selling Game of 2025 in the U.S.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is the best selling game of both December 2024 and the full year 2024 in the U.S., returning to the No.1 spot after Hogwarts Legacy took the crown in 2023.

This is according to Circana data and analysis by Mat Piscatella shared with IGN. The annual Call of Duty release historically is almost always the No.1. best-selling game in the U.S. each year by dollar sales going back to 2008, with a few exceptions. Both Grand Theft Auto V and Red Dead Redemption II beat it out in their respective release years, and in 2023, Hogwarts Legacy took the crown. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 was back on top this year, though it’s possible that victory is short-lived given Grand Theft Auto VI’s expected release late this year.

This year, Call of Duty was also once again the best-selling franchise in the U.S. for a record 16th year in a row.

EA Sports College Football 25, the No.2 best-selling game of 2024 and the No.3 best-selling game of December, was also the best-selling sports game in U.S. history.

Not a single Nintendo game cracked the top 20 for 2024, though that’s possibly because Nintendo does not share digital sales data with Circana, meaning all Nintendo first-party games on this list are only including physical sales in their rankings. That said, on the Nintendo Switch console, Super Mario Party Jamboree was the best-selling game of the year, followed by Mario Kart 8 at No. 2 and Mario & Luigi: Brothership at No.3.

Most of the rankings for the month of December were releases from earlier in the year or even prior years, given a low number of new releases. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle was the only new release ranking in December, at No.14. Because Circana tracks in dollar sales, we don’t see new releases Marvel Rivals (free-to-play) or Path of Exile 2 ($30, as opposed to $60) on the top-selling games list. However, both ranked on Circana’s tracking of the top games in the U.S. by Steam MAUs (No.1 and No.3 for December, respectively) and Marvel Rivals was also No.3 on PS5 and Xbox Series by MAUs.

For the full year, content spending in the U.S. increased by 2% to $50.6 billion, the second highest total for content spending in U.S. history, behind 2021’s $52 billion. There was an 11% drop in console content spending, but it was balanced out by growth in all other content areas. For December by itself, video game content spending was down 5% year over year to $5.8 billion. There was a 21% drop in console content spending in December, but PC content spending grew 13%.

Hardware spending for 2024 dropped 25% from 2023 to $4.9 billion, with PS5 as the best-selling console of both the month and the year. Switch was second place for the year in unit sales, while Xbox Series finished second in dollar sales. Digital editions made up 45% of PS5s sold in the U.S. during 2024, and 44% of Xbox Series.

For the month of December alone, hardware spending was down 29% from 2023 to $1.1 billion in December. All three console makers saw the drop: PS5 hardware spending dropped 18%, and Xbox Series and Switch both dropped by 38%.

For the full year, overall spending on games was down 1.1% to $58.7 billion. For December, total spending dropped 8.9% year over year to $7.5 billion.

The top 20 best-selling games in the U.S. for the month of December, based on dollar sales:

1. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
2. Madden NFL 25
3. EA Sports College Football 25
4. EA Sports FC 25
5. Super Mario Party Jamboree*
6. Sonic X Shadow Generations
7. Hogwarts Legacy
8. Astro Bot
9. Minecraft*
10. NBA 2K25*
11. Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero
12. Elden Ring
13. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2
14. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle
15. Helldivers II
16. Mario Kart 8
17. Mario & Luigi: Brothership*
18. God of War: Ragnarok
19. The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom*
20. Just Dance 2025 Edition

The top 20 best-selling games in the U.S. for the full year 2024, based on dollar sales:

1. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
2. EA Sports College Football 25
3. Helldivers II
4. Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero
5. NBA 2K25*
6. Madden NFL 25
7. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III (2023)
8. EA Sports FC 25
9. Elden Ring
10. EA Sports MVP Bundle
11. Hogwarts Legacy
12. Dragon’s Dogma II
13. WWE 2K24*
14. MLB: The Show 24*
15. Grand Theft Auto V*
16. Minecraft*
17. Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth
18. Tekken 8
19. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2
20. NBA 2K24*

* Indicates that some or all digital sales are not included in Circana’s data. Some publishers, including Nintendo and Take-Two, do not share certain digital data for this report.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to [email protected].