UK games market hit over £3.8 billion last year, digital sales on the rise

The Entertainment Retailers Association has announced that the UK video games market pulled in a whopping £3.864 billion in 2018, with over three billion (80.1%) of the figure made up of digital sales alone. The number does not include hardware.

Digital goods saw an increase of 12.5% during the last year, while sales of physical copies declined by 2.8%. That's not to say people aren't buying games at brick-and-mortar retailers anymore, though. 2018's biggest selling game, FIFA 19, moved 1.89 million physical units alone out of a total of 2.5 million sold.

In terms of hardware, GI.biz reports that over 2.4 million game consoles were sold last year in Blighty, with more systems moved in 2018 compared to the year before. Of those sold, the PS4 did the most numbers, although Nintendo Switch saw the biggest growth year-on-year at 20%.

We've also got an idea of how well games actually sold last year in terms of physical numbers. FIFA 19 is perhaps unsurprisingly top of the list, followed by Red Dead Redemption 2 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 4.

You can see the full Top 20 below.

1. FIFA 191,889,4012

2. Red Dead Redemption 21,757,212

3 Call of Duty: Black Ops 41,172,855

4 Spider-Man 676,621

5. Mario Kart 8: Deluxe 458,675

6. Far Cry 5 434,133

7. Crash Bandicoot N-Sane Trilogy 430,551

8. God of War 399,395

9. Forza Horizon 4392,960

10. FIFA 18351,788

11. Grand Theft Auto V 339,805

12. Spyro Reignited Trilogy 333,725

13. Battlefield V 313,100

14. Assassin's Creed Odyssey 305,937

15. Super Smash Bros Ultimate 284,155

16. Super Mario Odyssey 240,710

17. Call of Duty: WWII 230,576

18. Pokemon: Let's Go, Pikachu 227,767

19. Shadow of the Tomb Raider 226,125

20. Fallout 76218,534