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Microsoft quietly announced on Friday that it would be raising the prices for its Xbox Series X and S consoles in the United States. The Series X will increase by $50, the 2TB version of the Series X by $70, and the Series S by $20 starting October 3. This marks the second price jump for these consoles this year, making the Series S price hike a total of $100, the Series X a total of $150, and the 2TB variant an increase of $200.
Many have quickly pointed to new tariffs introduced by the US administration as the reason behind these price increases. According to former Blizzard president Mike Ybarra, however, that explanation only scratches the surface.
In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Ybarra states, “Console price increases are not tariff issues; they are profit issues. And why profits aren’t where they should be is a far, far deeper issue than the tariff excuse.”
He further clarifies that while tariffs explain one increase, the second jump in price is due to different problems and consumers will continue to pay for these. Tariffs serve as an excuse to keep raising prices.
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This year’s introduced tariffs are certainly part of the hardware price increases from Nintendo, PlayStation, and Xbox. However, Ybarra’s point that Microsoft’s struggles when competing with PlayStation and Nintendo go deeper than this year’s tariffs is not entirely wrong. These challenges began long before the current tariff situation.
