In 2015, Microsoft stopped announcing Xbox sales numbers, and now the company has shed more light on that decision. Xbox CFO Tim Stuart said at the Wells Fargo 2023 TMT Summit this week that Microsoft doesn't publicly discloses these figures because, as Microsoft sees it, a unit-sales number alone doesn't provide the clearest picture of how the Xbox brand is performing overall.

For what it's worth, both Sony and Nintendo announce new hardware sales numbers every quarter. Xbox is understood to be in last place when it comes to console sales compared to PlayStation and Switch, and that might be another reason for Microsoft's lack of console sales disclosure.

Stuart said at the summit, "At first it was like, 'What are you doing?' 'You're the Xbox business and you're not giving us console [sales numbers], that makes no sense.' But it was really the first point of us saying, no, no, it's about content and services."