Video Game Console Prices Through the Years: Every Launch Price in Today's Dollars

01Every Launch Price, Then and Now

Each dot is a console's U.S. launch price. Switch between the price on the box and the same price in September 2026 dollars. In real terms the most expensive machines came early: the late 1970s and early 1990s produced several consoles that would cost well over $1,000 today. The $299.00 PlayStation of 1995 would be about $661 now, and the $449.99 Switch 2 of 2025 sits near the middle of the range.

Lowest-priced model on sale at U.S. launch; add-ons such as the Sega CD are left out of the chart. Adjusted with the CPI-U annual average for the launch year and the September 2026 CPI-U for today.

02Consoles Used to Get Cheaper. Not Anymore

For most of the industry's history, a console's launch price was the most it would ever cost. Manufacturers cut prices as parts got cheaper and sales slowed: the PlayStation 2 dropped a third in 2002, the PlayStation 3 fell $100 at a time, and the Nintendo 3DS was cut less than five months after launch. The current generation has gone the other way. Starting in 2025, Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo all raised U.S. prices on consoles already on shelves, citing costs and the economic environment; news reports also pointed to tariffs and the price of memory chips.

U.S. list prices from the manufacturers as of November 2026. Retail and bundle prices vary.

Price Changes, Newest First

03Every Console Launch Price

Click a column heading to sort. Hours of work uses average hourly earnings for production and nonsupervisory workers in the launch year, a measure that starts in 1964.

Launch prices are the manufacturer's suggested U.S. retail price for the lowest-priced model on sale at launch; other models sold at launch are shown in brackets. Consoles sold as separate machines, such as the Xbox Series X and Series S, have their own rows, and add-ons are marked as such. Dates for the earliest systems are approximate, and several were test-marketed before a national launch. The NES opened in New York in October 1985 and went nationwide in 1986.

04The Best-Selling Consoles

Price is only part of the story. Several of the biggest sellers were the cheaper machines of their generation, and the Nintendo DS and Game Boy launched under $150.

Worldwide units, from Nintendo's and Sony's published figures where available and widely cited estimates for older systems. Microsoft stopped reporting Xbox sales regularly in 2015, so its figures are the last it disclosed. Consoles over 10 million units.

05How This Page Works

Launch prices are the U.S. suggested retail prices announced by the manufacturers, checked against contemporary reports. Today's dollars use the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U), with the launch year's annual average and the newest monthly index, so the figures update when each new CPI is released. Hours of work divide the launch price by average hourly earnings for production and nonsupervisory employees in the launch year (BLS). For any other price, use the inflation calculator.

Prices through September 2026.

06Frequently Asked Questions

Related: Hours-of-Work Price Museum · Movie ticket prices by year · What did it cost? · Tariff calculator