James Bond proves he’s just as good for video game sales as he is for the box office, if the latest report from industry-tracking firm Circana is anything to go by. 007 First Light is the best-selling game for May 2026, and, with help from the Switch 2, drove video game sales for the month up by 3%. (For the record, I cycled through several ridiculous headlines before I settled on that one.)
| May 2026 Dollar Sales, Millions | May 2025 | May 2026 | Change |
| Total Video Game Sales (Projected to Total Market) | $4,076 | $4,182 | 3% |
| Video Game Content (Physical & Digital Full Game, DLC/MTX and Subscription consumer spending across Console, Cloud, Mobile*, Portable, PC and VR platforms) | $3,741 | $3,765 | 1% |
| Video Game Hardware | $180 | $249 | 38% |
| Video Game Accessories | $155 | $168 | 8% |
“007 First Light was May’s leader in full game dollar sales, debuting as the 4th best-seller of 2026 year-to-date,” said Mat Piscatella, Circana’s senior director of video games. “It also led all titles in full game dollar sales on PlayStation platforms in the month. Launch month full game dollar sales of 007 First Light were the highest for a James Bond video game in franchise history.”
Hardware sales for the month continue to rise, being up a full 38% from the previous May. this is mostly due to the Switch 2, which is the best-selling console of the year to date. PlayStation and Xbox console sales both fell to historic lows for their brands, though the report noted elsewhere that console players drove a large portion of content spending growth for the month.
| Year-to-Date Dollar Sales, Millions | YTD 2025 | YTD 2026 | Change |
| Total Video Game Sales (Projected to Total Market) | $22,039 | $22,997 | 4% |
| Video Game Content (Physical & Digital Full Game, DLC/MTX and Subscription consumer spending across Console, Cloud, Mobile*, Portable, PC and VR platforms) | $19,911 | $20,434 | 3% |
| Video Game Hardware | $1,152 | $1,584 | 37% |
| Video Game Accessories | $976 | $979 | 0% |
As noted by my previous interview with Piscatella, this could be the last month that we see this massive an upswing in hardware, as June 2026 will have to compete with June 2025, the launch month of the Switch 2. The numbers are probably going to suffer this year by comparison. He also noted in this month’s report that the average price of a new video game hardware unit has gone up to $502, up 14% from last year.
Circana May 2026 | Top 10 best-selling games in the U.S.
| Rank | Last Month Rank | Title | Publisher |
| 1 | NEW | 007 First Light* | IO Interactive |
| 2 | NEW | Forza Horizon 6* | Microsoft (Corp) |
| 3 | NEW | LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight^ | Warner Bros. Games |
| 4 | NEW | Subnautica 2* | Unknown Worlds Entertainment |
| 5 | 1 | Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream* | Nintendo |
| 6 | 4 | MLB: The Show^* | Multiple Video Game Publishers |
| 7 | 3 | Crimson Desert* | Pearl Abyss |
| 8 | NEW | Yoshi and the Mysterious Book* | Nintendo |
| 9 | 12 | Call of Duty: Black Ops 7^ | Microsoft (Corp) |
| 10 | 10 | Mario Kart World* | Nintendo |
As stated last month, Circana’s new charts include both actual and projected sales, in order to give a more complete picture of sales even without direct reported data. This is most obvious in the placement of Nintendo titles, which make up 3 of the 10 entries on the list, including the May title Yoshi & the Mysterious Book.
May’s flowers make it onto the bestseller list
Games launched in May take up a full half of the month’s sales charts, with 007 First Light being right in the top slot. Forza Horizon 6 and LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight pull in the franchise familiarity to round out the top 3. Similarly, Yoshi and the Mysterious Book pulls into the eighth slot, likely thanks to a boost from both the familiar name and Yoshi’s appearance in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie.
Subnautica 2 taking the fourth slot is not surprising, perhaps, but it does add a new wrinkle to the ongoing story of the game’s development and launch. At last report, Krafton and Unknown Worlds were still at loggerheads over Subnautica 2 meeting certain launch milestones (and the potential payouts that come with those milestones). The game’s inclusion on this list would seem to indicate it met those goals and then some.
Circana May 2026 |10 best-selling games of 2026 so far
| Rank | Last Month Rank | Title | Publisher |
| 1 | 1 | Resident Evil Requiem^ | Capcom USA |
| 2 | 2 | Crimson Desert* | Pearl Abyss |
| 3 | 3 | MLB: The Show 26^* | Multiple Video Game Publishers |
| 4 | NEW | 007 First Light* | IO Interactive |
| 5 | NEW | Forza Horizon 6^ | Microsoft (Corp) |
| 6 | 4 | Pokemon: Pokopia* | Nintendo |
| 7 | NEW | LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight^ | Warner Bros. Games |
| 8 | 9 | Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream* | Nintendo |
| 9 | 5 | WWE 2K26^ | Take-Two Interactive |
| 10 | 7 | Call of Duty: Black Ops 7^ | Microsoft (Corp) |
As with the monthly bestsellers list, May put several games on the year-to-date list. This might be a bit fussy of me, but I’m almost a little annoyed that 007 First Light is in slot 4, and Forza Horizon 6 is in slot 5.
Anyway, they’ve both made it onto the list thanks to sales data put out by the companies themselves. IO Interactive recently revealed that First Light had sold 3 million copies in its first month of launch. LEGO Batman is no slouch, either, hitting the seventh slot on the list thanks to the perpetual appeal of the Dark Knight and the LEGO franchise.