Grand Theft Auto V dethrones Elden Ring on the U.K. digital charts, becomes the year’s second largest digital launch

After a monumentally successful first few weeks, it seemed as though Elden Ring was unstoppable for the foreseeable future. As it turns out, a re-release of a nearly decade-old game was enough to topple it. The juggernaut known as Grand Theft Auto V overtook Elden Ring’s spot on the U.K. digital charts.

According to data from Games Sales Data, which GamesIndustry.biz had access to, Grand Theft Auto V was the best-selling digital game in the U.K. for the week ending on March 20. This is down to the recently released current-gen iterations, which combined across Xbox and PlayStation, accounted for 90% of its digital sales in the region.

Despite being nine years old, toppling Elden Ring wasn’t good enough. Grand Theft Auto V is also the region’s second-biggest digital launch of the year so far, behind only Elden Ring. The sales become even more impressive when examining the platform split and release model.

The PlayStation 5 version sold 55% during the week compared to the Xbox Series consoles’ 35%. A likely reasoning behind the split comes down to the PlayStation version being half the price due to Rockstar’s marketing deal with Sony.

Grand Theft Auto Online is free on PlayStation 5 for the first three months, which is what allowed such a price discrepancy on Sony’s platform. At this stage in its life cycle, the majority of the playerbase would likely be more interested in the ongoing Grand Theft Auto Online. Despite this freebie, Grand Theft Auto V still topped the U.K. digital charts, with Grand Theft Auto Online coming in at third, just behind Elden Ring.