Microsoft has quietly discontinued the entire Xbox One line of consoles including the Xbox One X, instead focusing on its two-pronged Xbox Series X and Series S instead.
This comes just after news that PlayStation would be ramping up production of the PS4s to fill the gap left by the PS5 shortage.
Microsoft confirmed to the Verge that seeing the Xbox One discontinued was directly related to the global semiconductor shortage, allowing the company more resources to focus on the Xbox Series X and Series S consoles instead.
“To focus on production of Xbox Series X / S, we stopped production for all Xbox One consoles by the end of 2020,” says Cindy Walker, senior director of Xbox console product marketing, in a statement to The Verge.
Senior analyst Daniel Ahmad also chimed in, saying that Microsoft’s decision to release two next-gen consoles is working in its favor.
“As per previous tweets, the dual SKU Series X|S strategy is paying off earlier than expected for MS, partially due to the pandemic. While Microsoft never released sales figures for XB1, we estimate the Xbox One Family sold in around 56 million units, just under half of PS4.“, he says.
Combined with GamePass giving subscribers a healthy library of games to play, he described it as “the service that wraps up all those entry points together, lowering barriers to entry for TV / AAA gaming”.
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