Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is biggest release in history

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 had its biggest three-day opening sales in the 20-plus year history of the franchise, Microsoft announced in its earnings call today.

Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, said in the first quarter earnings call today, “Last week’s launch of Black Ops 6 was the biggest Call of Duty release ever, setting a record for day one players, as well as Game Pass subscriber adds on launch day. Unit sales on PlayStation and Steam were also up over 60 percent year-over-year.”

The game is the first Call of Duty made across four years in quite some time, as Treyarch and Raven Software — two leads of nine studios that worked on the game — had more time than the usual three years to prepare the title. And it’s lucky for Microsoft as this is the first release under its ownership since it acquired Activision Blizzard last year for $68.7 billion.

Matt Cox, senior vice president and general manager of Call of Duty, said in a statement, “Thank you to our players around the world for making Black Ops 6 the biggest Call of Duty launch ever. Our goal from the start has been to bring this great game to as many players as possible wherever they are, however they play. Black Ops 6 is an amazing game, and the response from the Call of Duty community has been incredible. This is only the beginning. Nuketown is only days away and Season 1 is right around the corner. We’re just getting started.” 

This also happens to be the first Call of Duty game released on opening day on Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass subscription service, where players can access the game on the higher subscription tier.

As of October 2023, Call of Duty sold more 425 million copies in its franchise history, and it had 100 million monthly active players across all platforms. The franchise generated $30 billion in revenue by 2022. Right now, Call of Duty requires thousands of developers across nine studios to make every year, and that is really the benchmark for the game industry on the biggest that triple-A can get.