Critical reception Pre-release Pre-release reception to the console from developers and journalists was positive. Mark Rein of
Epic Games praised the "enhanced" architecture of Sony's system, describing it as "a phenomenal piece of hardware".
John Carmack, programmer and co-founder of
id Software, also commended the design by saying "Sony made wise engineering choices", while Randy Pitchford of
Gearbox Software expressed satisfaction with the amount of high-speed memory in the console. Eurogamer also called the graphics technology in the PS4 "impressive" and an improvement from the difficulties developers experienced on the PlayStation 3. ExtremeTech says the PS4's graphics processing unit offers a "serious advantage" over the competition, but due to the nature of cross-platform development, games that share the same assets will appear "very similar". In other scenarios, designers may tap some of PS4's additional power in a straightforward manner, to boost frame rate or output at a higher resolution, whereas games from Sony's own first-party studios that take full advantage of the hardware "will probably look significantly better than anything on the Xbox One." In response to concerns surrounding the possibility of
DRM measures to hinder the resale of used games (and in particular, the initial DRM policies of
Xbox One, which did contain such restrictions),
Jack Tretton explicitly stated during Sony's E3 press conference that there would be "no restrictions" on the resale and trading of PS4 games on physical media, while software product development head Scott Rohde specified that Sony was planning to disallow
online passes as well, going on to say that the policies were designed to be "consumer-friendly, extremely retailer-friendly, and extremely publisher-friendly". After Sony's
E3 2013 press conference,
IGN responded positively to Sony's attitude towards indie developers and trading games, stating they thought "most gamers would agree" that "if you care about games like [Sony] do, you'll buy a PlayStation 4". PlayStation 4's removable and upgradable
hard drive also drew praise from
IGN, with Scott Lowe commenting that the decision gave the console "another advantage" over the Xbox One, whose hard drive cannot be accessed.
GameSpot called the PlayStation 4 "the gamer's choice for next-generation", citing its price, lack of restrictive
digital rights management, and most importantly, Sony's efforts to "acknowledge its consumers" and "respect its audience" as major factors.
Post-release The PlayStation 4 has received very positive reviews from critics. Scott Lowe of
IGN gave it an 8.2 rating out of 10 praising the console's DualShock 4 design and social integration features. He criticized the console's lack of software features and for underutilizing the DualShock 4's touch pad.
The Gadget Show gave a similar review complimenting the DualShock 4's new triggers and control sticks, in addition to the new Remote Play feature, yet criticized the system's lack of media support at launch.
IGN compared the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4 over various categories, allowing their readers to vote for their preferred system. The PS4 won every category offered, and
IGN awarded the PS4 with their People's Choice Award. Shortly following the launch, it became apparent that some games released on multiple platforms were available in higher resolutions on the PS4 as opposed to other video game consoles. Kirk Hamilton of
Kotaku reported on the differences in early games such as
Call of Duty: Ghosts and ''
Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag'' which ran at 1080p on the PS4, but in 720p and 900p, respectively, on the
Xbox One.
Sales }); Spain 700K (); Portugal 100K () Demand for PlayStation 4 was strong. In August 2013, Sony announced the placement of over a million preorders for the console, while on the North American launch alone, one million PlayStation 4 consoles were sold. In the UK, the PlayStation 4 became the best-selling console at launch, with the sale of 250,000 consoles within a 48-hour period and 530,000 in the first five weeks. On January 7, 2014,
Andrew House announced in his
Consumer Electronics Show keynote speech that 4.2 million PS4 units had been sold-through by the end of 2013, with more than 9.7 million software units sold. On February 18, 2014, Sony announced that, as of February 8, it had sold over 5.3 million console units following the release of the PS4 onto the North American and Western/Central European markets. Within the first two days of release in Japan during the weekend of February 22, 2014, 322,083 consoles were sold. PS4 software unit sales surpassed 20.5 million on April 13, 2014. During Japan's 2013
fiscal year, heightened demand for the PS4 helped Sony top global console sales, beating Nintendo for the first time in eight years. According to data released by
Nielsen in August 2014, nine months after the PS4 was released, thirty-one percent of its sales were to existing Wii and Xbox 360 owners, none of whom had by then owned a PS3. At
Gamescom 2014, it was announced that 10 million PS4 units had been sold-through to consumers worldwide, and on November 13, it was announced that the PlayStation 4 was the top-selling console in the U.S. for the tenth consecutive month. In its first sales announcement of 2015, Sony confirmed on January 4 that it had sold-through 18.5 million PlayStation 4 units. Sony updated the sell-through figures for the system throughout 2015: over 20 million consoles , over 30 million , and over 35 million by the end of 2015. As of May 22, 2016, total worldwide sell-through reached 40 million. As of December 2018, over 91 million consoles and more than 876 million PlayStation 4 games have been sold worldwide. By October 2019, the PS4 had sold 102.8 million times, making it the second
best-selling video game console of all time, behind the
PlayStation 2. The PlayStation 4 holds a market share of at least 70% within all European countries, . == Hardware revisions ==