PlayStation beats Xbox to become the most popular console

The debate over which console is the best is an age-old topic amongst gamers. If it comes down to sales, then the PlayStation 2 would be crowned the winner. But the technological advances since then have allowed for more capable consoles to be created. Will there ever be a definitive winner?

Determined to close the case once and for all, TopRatedCasinos.co.uk utilised social media to work out which console is the most popular amongst gamers. They calculated the number of mentions, hashtags, and views across four leading social media platforms: Instagram, TikTok, Reddit and YouTube. Then a final score of “Social Popularity Points” was given to each console.

The most popular consoles on social media

The PlayStation 4 is the most popular console on social media, with a perfect score on Instagram, TikTok, and Reddit  (25/25), and 23/25 on YouTube totalling up to 98/100 overall. Released in November 2013,  the PS4 is the fourth best-selling console of all time with 116 million sales as of July 2021.

The Xbox One follows in second place with 88/100. The console scored a near-perfect 24/25 on Instagram, and 23/25 on TikTok and Reddit, butwas let down by a lower score on YouTube (19/25). Released at roughly the same time as the PS4 in November 2013, the Xbox One  has sold less than half the amount of consoles as its competitor at just over 50 million.

In third is the PlayStation 5 with a score of 76/100, let down by its Reddit score of 10/25, despite strong scores on TikTok and YouTube (24/25). Despite not having nearly as much time as the top two  to make an impact (released in November 2020), the console  has been in red hot demand since its release date, and would have sold many more than the current amount of 20 million units if not for a global shortage of the components to manufacture them.

Which console manufacturer is the best?

PlayStation came out on top again with an overall score of 63/100, taking the average score from thePS1, PS2, PS3, PS4, PS5, andPSP. The gaming brand scored highest on Instagram and TikTok with 19/25. 

Nintendo came in second with a score of 50/100 taken from the Nintendo 64, GameCube, Wii, Wii U, GameBoy, DS, 2DS, 3DS, and the highest ranked of the group, the Nintendo Switch. 

Xbox ranked the lowest with an overall score of 38/100, taken from the Xbox (original console), Xbox 360, Xbox One, and the Xbox Series X/S. Despite a higher score than Nintendo on Instagram and TikTok with 13/25, the low score of 6/25 on Reddit and YouTube lets it down. 

Methodology

1. _{TopRatedCasinos.co.uk compiled a list of all gaming consoles from PlayStation, Nintendo and Xbox using multiple sources.}
2. _{They then created a list of variations of each console to use as search criteria: e.g., ‘playstation1’, ‘playstationone’, ‘ps1’, ‘psone’, etc.}
3. _{Each variation was typed into the Instagram hashtag feature, the results noted down and totalled for each console.}
4. _{Each variation was typed into the TikTok hashtag feature, giving the total number of times videos tagged with those search criteria were watched.}
5. _{Each variation was typed into redditsearch.io to find how many times each console was mentioned in the subs r/Gaming and r/Games.}
6. _{The standard name for each console was typed into YouTube and filtered by most viewed videos. Videos were only used if they featured the console, information about the console, or came from an official account.}
7. _{Finally, each set of data was assigned a score from 0-25 and each console was given a score out of 100 to rank their overall social popularity.}
8. _{All data is correct as of 24/07/2022, but subject to change.}

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