The best-selling video game of all time is Minecraft, which Microsoft put past 425 million copies in October 2026, and Grand Theft Auto V is second at nearly 235 million. This list ranks the ten games that have sold the most paid copies, using only the figures their publishers have reported, each with the date it was reported, because trackers and estimate sites guess while publishers count. One game is one entry across every platform and re-release of the same game, free-to-play downloads do not count, bundled copies count the way the publisher counts them, and the rules are spelled out in How We Counted after the list.
10. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
CD Projekt reported that The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt had passed 65 million copies in its first-quarter 2026 results on May 28, 2026, and repeated the figure in September, when it also put the whole Witcher series past 90 million. The total covers every release of the same game since May 2015: the PC, PS4 and Xbox One originals, the 2019 Switch port, the free 2022 update for PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC, and The Witcher 3 Remastered, which arrived on September 29, 2026, as a free upgrade for owners. It got there by being the rare open world whose side quests are better than most games’ main stories, with two expansions, Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine, that still set the bar for paid add-ons, and CD Projekt says a third, Songs of the Past, is due in 2027. It shares its figure with Skyrim, and How We Counted explains why it sits one place lower. Our Witcher 3 hub covers the Remastered edition, starting with the best PC settings, and our best Witcher 3 Remastered mods list covers what to add once you have finished it.
9. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Bethesda Game Studios wrote that Skyrim had passed 65 million copies in a note to players on July 17, 2026, the same note that named The Elder Scrolls VI as the studio’s primary focus; the studio’s previous figure was 60 million, given in 2023. Skyrim launched on November 11, 2011, on PC, PS3 and Xbox 360, and the count includes every edition since: the 2016 Special Edition, the 2017 Switch port, Skyrim VR and the 2021 Anniversary Edition, which is how it became the game that runs on everything. The design is why the editions kept selling: you can walk in any direction from the opening cart ride, build any kind of character without picking a class, and on PC the mod scene has kept it new for fifteen years. Bethesda’s count and CD Projekt’s are the same round number, so the tiebreak in How We Counted decides the order. Our Elder Scrolls hub covers Skyrim and Oblivion Remastered, our best Skyrim mods list is the place to start a new playthrough, and console players have a separate PS5 Creations list.
8. Terraria
Re-Logic marked Terraria‘s fifteenth birthday on May 16, 2026, with a count of 70 million copies: 39.6 million on PC, 19.7 million on mobile and 10.7 million on consoles. A 2D sandbox that still costs $9.99 on Steam has outsold nearly every blockbuster ever made, and it did it the slow way, with fifteen years of free updates and no price rises or microtransactions, a point Re-Logic made in the same post. Its hook is that mining, building and boss fights feed each other: every new ore unlocks gear that reaches a biome that holds the next boss, and a world keeps surprising you a hundred hours in. The same post says crossplay is on deck and that updates will continue beyond 1.4.6. Our Terraria hub has the guides, and our best Terraria mods list covers tModLoader, which Re-Logic puts at 12.3 million Steam downloads.
7. PUBG: Battlegrounds
Krafton’s free-to-play announcement on January 12, 2022, put PUBG: Battlegrounds at more than 75 million copies sold across PC and consoles, and that is where its paid count stops: the game has been free since that day, with a one-time $12.99 Battlegrounds Plus upgrade, and everyone who had bought it was upgraded automatically. Those 75 million copies took less than five years. PUBG entered Steam Early Access in March 2017, reached 1.0 and Xbox One that December, added PS4 a year later, and at its January 2018 peak had 3.25 million people playing at once on Steam, a figure Krafton repeated in its sixth-anniversary stats. It sold because it defined the battle royale: a hundred players, one shrinking circle, and a last-team-standing round that every big shooter has copied since. PUBG Mobile is a separate free game and is not counted, and Krafton cancelled the spin-off PUBG: Black Budget in October 2026.
6. Mario Kart 8 and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
Nintendo’s Switch sales table lists Mario Kart 8 Deluxe at 72.00 million copies as of September 30, 2026, and its Wii U table has the 2014 original at 8.46 million, for 80.46 million copies of the same game. It is the one entry built from two releases, under our rule that a re-release counts with the original. Deluxe launched in April 2017 with every Wii U track and both DLC packs built in, and Nintendo had sold 157.20 million Switch consoles by the same date, so close to one in two Switch owners bought it; Nintendo’s figures include copies bundled with hardware, and Deluxe has featured in Switch bundles. The Booster Course Pass of 2022 and 2023 doubled it to 96 courses, which kept it selling right up to Mario Kart World, the Switch 2 follow-up that Nintendo has at 16.48 million as of the same date. Our Mario Kart hub covers World, and the original has a place on our best Wii U games list.
5. Wii Sports
Nintendo’s investor site listed Wii Sports at 82.90 million copies in its Wii table, last dated March 31, 2024, before the company dropped the Wii from its current sales pages in 2025; the older copy of that table still on nintendo.co.jp, dated September 30, 2016, shows 82.79 million, and either figure puts it fifth. Most of those copies came in the box. Wii Sports was packed in with the Wii in most regions from launch in November 2006 (Japan sold it separately), and Nintendo’s software figures count bundled copies. It earned the slot anyway: swinging a Wii Remote at a tennis ball or rolling it down a bowling lane sold the console to people who had never bought a game, and it stayed the demo in every living room for the Wii’s whole life. Nintendo’s follow-ups never caught it, with Wii Sports Resort at 33.14 million on Nintendo’s 2024 table and the Switch successors arriving as Nintendo Switch Sports and, in October 2026 on Switch 2, Switch Sports Resort. Our best Wii games list covers what else the console did well.
4. Red Dead Redemption 2
Take-Two’s November 2026 investor presentation puts Red Dead Redemption 2 at more than 89 million units, with the whole Red Dead series past 118 million. Rockstar’s western launched on PS4 and Xbox One on October 26, 2018, reached PC in November 2019, and has kept selling at a pace few eight-year-old games manage, helped by Red Dead Online coming free with every copy and by the word of mouth a story this long earns. It is the most patient game on this list and the most detailed, a prequel in which Arthur Morgan watches the Van der Linde gang come apart across a map that runs from snowbound passes to bayou, and it remains Rockstar’s biggest seller after GTA V by a wide margin. Our Red Dead hub has the guides, and our best Red Dead Redemption 2 mods list covers the PC version.
3. Tetris (EA Mobile)
Tetris takes third on EA’s figure for its own mobile versions, the largest count any single Tetris publisher has reported. EA, the game’s exclusive mobile publisher from 2006, announced on January 21, 2010 that its Tetris games had passed 100 million paid downloads on phones since 2005, iPhone and iPod touch included, and called it the best-selling mobile phone game of all time. EA’s count stops there: the games sold on for another decade, until Tetris 2011 and the free Tetris Blitz closed on April 21, 2020, when the mobile license moved to N3TWORK, and no later figure from EA followed, so 100 million is a floor from the middle of the run rather than a total. The Tetris Company, which licenses the game rather than publishing it, said in April 2014 that Tetris had passed 425 million paid mobile downloads, a count for the game as a whole, whoever published each version, that would sit beside Minecraft if a publisher had reported it for one game, and its co-founder Henk Rogers has put the 1989 Game Boy cartridge at about 35 million, a version that appears in none of Nintendo’s sales tables. The reason so many people paid for a game they could already play somewhere else is that Alexey Pajitnov’s 1984 design fits any screen and any spare minute: seven falling pieces, a well to fill, and a round that lasts exactly as long as you can keep up. The screenshot shows Tetris 99 on Switch, Nintendo’s version, since EA’s phone games are gone. The Game Boy cartridge has its place on our best Game Boy games list.
2. Grand Theft Auto V
Take-Two told investors on its November 9, 2026, earnings call that Grand Theft Auto V has sold nearly 235 million units worldwide, and its November presentation puts the GTA series at nearly 480 million. No paid game has sold like this for this long: GTA V launched on PS3 and Xbox 360 on September 17, 2013, moved to PS4 and Xbox One in 2014, PC in 2015 and PS5 and Xbox Series X|S in 2022, and Take-Two says it reached $1 billion in retail sales faster than any entertainment release in history. Grand Theft Auto Online is the engine: the free online mode that came with every copy has had new heists, businesses and cars for thirteen years, so a 2013 game has stayed in the sales charts through three console generations. With Grand Theft Auto VI due on November 19, 2026, the open question is how fast the sequel climbs this list. Our GTA hub has every GTA V guide, our best GTA 5 mods list covers the PC version, and if you have finished it, our best games like GTA 5 list is next.
1. Minecraft
Microsoft put Minecraft at more than 425 million units sold in an Xbox Wire post on October 8, 2026, which also recalled the game’s previous record of 350 million; Mojang’s last count on its own site, from Minecraft Live in October 2023, was 300 million. That is roughly 190 million more than Grand Theft Auto V, and the gap is still widening: nothing else on this list added 125 million copies in three years.
Minecraft began as Markus Persson’s one-man project in 2009 and had sold a million copies before it had a version 1.0, and Microsoft bought Mojang for $2.5 billion in 2014. The design explains the rest: a world of blocks you can dig, build and survive in, with no instructions and no ending unless you go looking for one, that plays the same on a phone, a Switch 2 and a gaming PC, and that schools, families and servers of thousands of people all found a use for. It has also never stopped. Mojang now ships several free game drops a year instead of one big annual update, the 2025 film brought in another wave of new players, Minecraft Dungeons II arrived on September 29, 2026, and the September 2026 Minecraft Live announced The Sift, the first new dimension in more than fourteen years, for 2027. Our Minecraft hub has the guides for both editions, our best Minecraft mods list covers Java, and the best seeds and best shaders lists are the quickest ways to make a fifteen-year-old game look new.
How We Counted
Publisher figures only. Every number above is the one the game’s publisher reported, on the date given, and nothing else: no estimate sites, no sales trackers, and no figure that exists only in secondhand coverage. Publishers report sell-in, which is copies shipped to stores plus copies sold digitally (Nintendo calls them sales units and Take-Two calls them units sold-in), and we use them as reported. A figure is a floor, since every publisher reports in round numbers and then goes quiet for months, which is why each entry carries its date.
One game, every platform and every re-release. Mario Kart 8 and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe count together, as do Skyrim’s editions, The Witcher 3 and its Remastered edition, and EA’s Tetris on every phone it reached, iPhone included. A sequel, a spin-off or a remake with a new name is a separate game, so Wii Sports Resort, the first Red Dead Redemption and Minecraft Dungeons stand on their own.
Free-to-play downloads are out. Fortnite, PUBG Mobile, Pokemon GO and Roblox have no paid copies to count. PUBG: Battlegrounds counts only the 75 million copies Krafton reported before it went free on January 12, 2022.
Bundled copies count the way the publisher counts them. Nintendo’s tables include copies packed in with hardware, which is most of Wii Sports and some of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, and the entries say so.
Players are not copies. Blizzard reports Overwatch and Diablo IV in players, Curve Games called Human Fall Flat’s July 2026 anniversary figure 60 million players, and Activision reports Call of Duty as a series rather than one game at a time, so none of those has a figure that can be ranked here; Human Fall Flat’s place just outside the ten rests on Curve’s March 2026 unit count instead.
Ties. Skyrim and The Witcher 3 both stand at 65 million. We put Skyrim ahead because Bethesda’s count is the newer one, from July 17, 2026, while CD Projekt’s figure dates from May 28 and its September report repeated it rather than raising it. CD Projekt’s third-quarter results, due in late November, could flip them.
Just outside the ten. Human Fall Flat is first out: Curve Games put it at more than 58 million units sold across PC, consoles, mobile and VR in its Switch 2 launch announcement on March 19, 2026, a climb built on eight-player co-op and years of free levels, and it has a place on our best co-op PS5 games list. Animal Crossing: New Horizons is next at 50.63 million as of September 30, 2026, by Nintendo’s count, and our Animal Crossing hub covers it. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate sits at 38.50 million on the same table, Take-Two’s November 2026 presentation calls Borderlands 2 2K’s top seller at more than 31 million units (the series passed 100 million in November 2026), Bandai Namco’s count for Elden Ring still read more than 30 million units in August 2026, and Mario Kart World stands at 16.48 million as of September 30, 2026. Nintendo’s current tables cover Switch 2, Switch, Wii U and 3DS, so NES and Game Boy classics such as Super Mario Bros. and Pokemon Red and Blue have no live publisher figure, and neither would reach the ten on the figures Nintendo has given in the past.
Tetris is ranked on its publisher’s figure, not its licensor’s. The Tetris Company licenses the game to a different publisher on nearly every platform, and its own counts, such as the 425 million paid mobile downloads it announced in April 2014, cover the game as a whole, whoever published each version, so they do not fit a list of what publishers report. EA’s count for its own mobile Tetris is the largest figure any Tetris publisher has given for its versions, and it ranks as the floor it is. Nintendo has never published a figure for the 1989 Game Boy cartridge it packed in with the handheld outside Japan, so that version has its place on our best Game Boy games list instead.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best-selling video game of all time? Minecraft. Microsoft put it at more than 425 million units sold on October 8, 2026, roughly 190 million ahead of Grand Theft Auto V, which Take-Two had at nearly 235 million on November 9, 2026. The only other publisher figure that reaches 100 million is EA’s for its mobile Tetris, and it dates from January 2010.
What is the best-selling console game? On a single console, Wii Sports, at 82.90 million on the Wii by Nintendo’s last count, most of them packed in with the system. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe’s 72.00 million on Switch is the largest single-platform figure any publisher currently lists for a game that was not a standard pack-in. Grand Theft Auto V’s 235 million covers PS3, Xbox 360, PS4, Xbox One, PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC together, and Take-Two does not split it by platform.
What is the best-selling PC game? No publisher gives a clean answer. Mojang, Take-Two, Krafton, Bethesda and CD Projekt each report one worldwide figure, so the largest PC-only number any publisher on this list has put in writing is Terraria’s 39.6 million, from Re-Logic in May 2026. Minecraft began on PC and PUBG spent its first nine months as a PC-only game, but neither company has published a PC split.
Do free-to-play games count as best sellers? Not here. A free download is not a sale, so Fortnite, PUBG Mobile, Pokemon GO, Roblox and the free-to-play era of PUBG: Battlegrounds are left out, however many players they have. PUBG keeps its place for the 75 million paid copies Krafton reported before the switch in January 2022.
Why is Tetris only third? Because the largest figure a Tetris publisher has given is EA’s, and it stopped at 100 million paid mobile downloads in January 2010, ten years before EA’s Tetris games closed. The Tetris Company’s larger counts, such as the 425 million paid mobile downloads it announced in 2014, cover the game as a whole rather than one publisher’s versions, and Nintendo has no published figure for the Game Boy cartridge, so neither can be ranked against the publishers’ figures above.
Will Grand Theft Auto VI make this list? It launches on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S on November 19, 2026, and Take-Two’s next quarterly report, due in February 2027, is the first that can carry a sales figure for it. To enter at tenth it would need to pass the 65 million that The Witcher 3 and Skyrim share, and we will update the list when Take-Two reports.