Sony Q2 2026 Results: Wolverine Sales, PS Plus Growth and PS6 Update

Sony has raised its full-year outlook for its games business after a strong second quarter. The results were announced on Thursday, November 5, 2026, and covered the three months ending September 30.

Sony’s Game & Network Services Segment:

• Net sales: ¥1.2 trillion ($7.5 billion), up 9%

• Operating income: ¥220 billion ($1.3 billion), up 83%

• Game software revenue: ¥708.5 billion ($4.4 billion), up 12.5%

• Digital software and add-on content: ¥643.9 billion ($4 billion)

• Physical software revenue: ¥43.1 billion ($272 million), up 21.7%

• Network services revenue: ¥218.3 billion ($1.37 billion), up 19.7%

• Hardware revenue: ¥219.7 billion ($1.38 billion), down 4.8%

The jump in operating income looks dramatic, but there is context. The same period last year included a one-time loss of ¥49.8 billion, which covered a $765 million impairment loss from Bungie. Excluding those factors, operating income rose 29%.

Is Marvel’s Wolverine a Hit?

Sony credited Insomniac Games’ Marvel’s Wolverine for helping lift the segment. The game has sold 2.4 million units since its September 15 launch. That is decent, but it trails the pace of earlier Marvel releases.

As per PlayStation’s own 2018 Year in Review, Marvel’s Spider-Man sold 3.3 million copies in just three days. It later reached 9 million within 90 days. Wolverine also had a rocky start with critics, landing as Insomniac’s lowest-rated game in years on Metacritic.

According to market research firm Circana, Wolverine was the best-selling game in the US in September. It also delivered Sony’s biggest launch-month dollar sales since Helldivers II in February 2024. Meanwhile, Ghost of Yotei has sold 3.3 million copies since its October 2025 launch.

PlayStation Users

PlayStation’s player base keeps growing. Monthly active users reached 127 million, up from 119 million a year earlier. That marks a record high for September and a 7% increase year on year. Total logged play time also rose by 4%.

Console sales tell a different story. Sony sold 2.6 million PS5 units in the quarter, down from four million in the same period of 2025. CFO Lin Tao said the company was “able to offset the rise in memory prices” for PS5 hardware “through adjustments to promotions and pricing, as well as additional cost-reduction.”

Tao also addressed the decline directly. “Although new PS5 unit sales are gradually declining as expected at this stage of the console life cycle, the PlayStation platform continues to expand and grow in a stable manner,” she explained.

What Is the Latest on the PlayStation 6?

Tao said the next-generation platform is “progressing as scheduled,” with solid progress expected next year. On memory supply, she noted: “Regarding memory procurement for next fiscal year, based on discussions held so far with various suppliers, we have aligned on the quantity of memory needed for our projected hardware unit sales.”

Sony has not formally named the console yet. Tao said it will be announced “at an appropriate time in the future.” She also added that Sony will “attach great importance to a new platform and make the necessary investments for that.”

Pricing remains the big unknown. Earlier reports suggested the console’s memory and storage alone could cost more than $680. Some are already expecting a base price above $1,000, though nothing is confirmed.

Sony’s Updated Forecast

Looking ahead, Sony has lifted its expectations for the games segment:

• Full-year G&NS sales forecast: up 6% to ¥4.8 trillion ($30.3 billion)

• Operating income forecast: up 6% to ¥700 billion ($4.4 billion)

Tao linked the improved outlook to “the impact of higher third-party software and network services sales and decreased costs.” At the group level, Sony now expects ¥1.87 trillion ($11.8 billion) in operating income for the year through March, a 15% increase on its previous guidance.