While Sony's PlayStation 4 console was the number one selling game console in the US in July 2015, Microsoft says that sales of its own Xbox One were still up 44% compared to July 2014. What's more interesting is that, according to numbers from the research firm the NPD group, sales of games for the nearly 10 year old Xbox 360 were the second highest in the US on a per-unit basis, with only the PlayStation 4 beating it.
NPD analyst Liam Callahan believes the announcement from Microsoft on backwards compatibility for some Xbox 360 games on the Xbox One in July might have caused the surge in game sales:
"Consumers may have felt safer buying 360 games knowing that they will be able to play them on Xbox One if they choose to upgrade."
While Sony, Microsoft and NPD all did not offer specific unit numbers for console hardware sales in July, Callahan did say:
"After 21 months, combined Xbox One and PS4 hardware unit sales are close to 50 percent higher than the combined sales of Xbox 360 and PS3 after 21 months on the market."
Microsoft also added that active global Xbox Live users for both the Xbox One and Xbox 360 were up 22% in July 2015.
Source: Gamesindustry.biz
