Pokémon Legends: Z-A, the latest main-line installment in the Pokémon series, was released for the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 on October 16th. The game saw massive success during its launch, with its nearly 6 million copies sold placing Pokémon Legends: Z-A in the top 5 most successful Pokémon launches of all time. 

The Pokémon Company revealed the exact sales for Pokémon Legends: Z-A in a recent press release. Including both physical and digital versions of the game, Pokémon Legends: Z-A sold around 5.8 million copies during its launch week. Additionally, around half of these sales were for the Switch 2 version of the game. 

First Week Sales for Pokemon games pic.twitter.com/VdQlBCg4bi

— Pierre485 (@pierre485_) October 24, 2025

According to a user on X, these sales figures classify Pokémon Legends: Z-A as the 5th most successful Pokémon launch of all time. The game has beat the launches of several popular titles, namely Pokémon X/Y and Pokémon Let’s Go Pikachu/Eevee, by around 2 million copies sold. Additionally, its sales are only marginally lower than the 3rd and 4th most successful launches, with both Pokémon Sword/Shield and Pokémon Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl only having around 200,000 more copies sold. However, there remains a large gap in sales between Pokémon Legends: Z-A and the highest grossing launches in the series. For example, the game still sold around 4.2 million less than Pokémon Scarlet/Violet and around 700,000 less copies than Pokémon Legends: Arceus.

Pokémon Legends: Z-A acts as a spiritual sequel to the 2013 Pokémon X/Y games, taking place within Lumiose City of the Kalos region five years after the events of the original Generation 6 games. It is also the second installment in the Pokémon Legends series, following in the footsteps of its 2022 predecessor Pokémon Legends: Arceus. 

Despite the game’s massively successful launch, it currently sits at mixed reviews. On Metacritic, for example, it holds a favorable critic score of 78 out of 100 and an unfavorable user score of 4.7 out of 10. How these ratings will change due to the release of future updates or the game’s Mega Dimension DLC remains to be seen.