PC gamers buy way more games that cost less than $30 at launch compared to PlayStation and Xbox players, analysts say, and it's "reshaping the PC market"

PC gamers buy more cheap games than console gamers, and not just through the power of Steam sales, according to a recent report from analyst firm Newzoo. Full-price games that cost less than $30 are a much bigger chunk of the PC market compared to console gaming, and that segment is only growing year after year as cheap hits continue to crop up and hit even harder.

Newzoo reports that the $30 - $50 bracket "leads across all platforms," but the sub-$30 space "thrives on PC via breakout indies."

Since 2022, the report says, PC, PlayStation, and Xbox have actually seen relatively comparable percentage growth in total sub-$30 game sales – 40%, 50%, and 35% respectively. But actual spending tells a different story, with PC eclipsing both consoles, particularly when it comes to new releases.

These cheap games are dominated by back catalog titles on console, whereas PC, partly through the discoverability power of Steam, continues to surface and attract new viral hits. On PC, sales of new sub-$30 games have grown by 156% since 2022, Newzoo finds.

The top five sub-$30 games reported for each platform in 2025 (by revenue) help demonstrate this. Minecraft and Dead by Daylight unsurprisingly appear in the top five for all three platforms, but PC uniquely has Peak, REPO, and king of kings Schedule 1.

The percentage of total revenue represented by each game is also important, with Minecraft actually trailing Schedule 1 and barely beating REPO on PC, but more than tripling the revenue of runner-up Dead by Daylight on PlayStation and Xbox. In other words, this segment of "the console market is much smaller and dominated by Minecraft," as Newzoo puts it.

This portion of the report notably covers the US, UK, Germany, French, Spain, and Italy markets.

Drug dealing sim Schedule 1 obviously isn't available on console, but that's part of the conversation here. These games consistently perform better on PC via Steam, and so they consistently launch there – and often stay there, with many never making it to console, where indies and oddballs have a harder time finding visibility.

"Sub-$30 new releases are reshaping the PC market, capturing an increasing share of player spending year over year," Newzoo concludes. In 2025, it found that new releases that cost less than $30 represented a significant 9% of spending on PC.

The top new PC games reported for this bracket for previous years further illustrate how this space is evolving. In 2024, we had Palworld, Path of Exile 2, Enshrouded, Sons of the Forest, and TCG Card Shop Simulator. Newzoo adds that 2023 had Lethal Company, BattleBit Remastered, Dave the Diver, Party Animals, and Dredge.

A lot of these are early access games made by small teams, and games like TCG Card Shop Simulator helped give rise to entire genre booms that, again, have largely been incubated on Steam.

Another friendslop hit prints money on Steam as Gamble With Your Friends sells 500k copies in 3 days: "Speechless."