DSi UK sales off to strong start

92,000 sold during week one

Despite only launching in the UK last Friday, Blighty’s gamers have already grabbed almost 100,000 Nintendo DSis.

UK retailers shifted a whopping 92,000 DSi handheld consoles on Friday and Saturday last week, according to figures from market watcher GfK-ChartTrack.

However, last week’s UK DSi sales still weren’t enough to eclipse the 188,000 unit sales achieved by Sony’s PlayStation Portable during its first week on the UK market – week 35, 2005.

The DSi’s sales weren’t even enough to secure it second or third sales place – the console actually came fourth.

Second place is still held by Sony’s PlayStation 3, with first-week UK sales of 165,000 units. Third place was retained by Nintendo’s Wii – which sold 106,000 units during its first sales week in the UK.

Nonetheless, Dorian Bloch, UK Director of GfK-ChartTrack, told Register Hardware that the DSi’s UK first week sales are still “pretty good going”.

He added that pre-orders will have been a big part of the figure and hinted that the ongoing school Easter holidays are likely to help Nintendo maintain strong sales over the coming weeks. ®