Indies and original IP blew up in 2026

Indies and original IP blew up in 2026 More than half of the games that sold more than 500,000 units in their first month were the start of a new series, and 43% were indies Research by Sensor Tower – done at the request of GamesIndustry.biz – shows that indies and original IP made up a much higher proportion of the biggest PC and console games of 2026 when compared with 2025. The analytics firm picked out the games that had sold more than 500,000 units in their first month on sale in two 12-month date ranges: September 2024 to August 2025 (the 2025 cohort), and September 2025 to August 2026 (the 2026 cohort). In the 2025 cohort, a total of 55 games sold more than 500,000 units in their first month, while 76 games met the threshold in the 2026 cohort, and the number of units sold increased by 51% year on year, from 120.5 million to 182.4 million. Some of the biggest indie hits in the 2026 cohort were Meccha Chameleon (13.9 million units sold in the first month according to Sensor Tower estimates), How to Fish (7.9 million), Slay the Spire 2 (5.9 million), Hollow Knight: Silksong (5.2 million), and Escape from Duckov (4 million).