Skyrim hits 65 million units sold, matching The Witcher 3 in all-time sales

Todd Howard confirmed today that The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim has crossed 65 million units sold, officially placing it among the top 10 best-selling games of all time — a milestone it now shares with CD Projekt's The Witcher 3. The announcement came during a Bethesda Game Studios briefing following Xbox's latest round of layoffs.

Xbox boss Asha Sharma delivered the sales figure alongside updates on the rest of the BGS catalogue. Fallout 4 has crossed 35 million units sold, landing it in the top 25 all-time. Starfield has reached 17 million players and is about to cross 1 billion hours played, though no unit sales figure was given. Howard also offered a rare update on The Elder Scrolls VI, saying it is the studio's primary development focus, with the majority of the team working on it. "With over 65 million copies sold, players are still exploring Skyrim 15 years later, but we know it's been a very long wait for the sequel," Howard said. "The next chapter is on the way. We're where we planned to be, loving how it looks, and playing it every day." Fallout 5, meanwhile, has entered pre-production.

Skyrim launched in November 2011 and sold 3.5 million units in its first 48 hours. Over the following 14 years it was ported to virtually every platform capable of running it — including a notorious Alexa version — and a steady stream of mods has kept its player base alive long past what any normal game sustains. The Elder Scrolls VI was first teased at E3 2018, making it one of gaming's longest-running announced-but-not-shown projects; reports suggest it is still at least two years from release. CD Projekt announced The Witcher 3 hit 65 million in May, and with The Witcher IV in development alongside Elder Scrolls VI, the two franchises are shaping up for a direct collision — possibly around 2028. For scale: Minecraft sits at 400 million all-time, GTA 6 at 230 million, and Red Dead Redemption 2 at 85 million.

The Howard quote is the most substantive public comment on Elder Scrolls VI in years, and fans are treating it as meaningful reassurance rather than a firm timeline. With Fallout 5 now confirmed in pre-production, BGS has a packed pipeline — but Elder Scrolls VI remains the one the community is watching most closely.