Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft sold, respectively, 604,200, 490,700 and 1.1m next-gen games consoles in the US in December 2006, retail market watcher NPD said last week. The company's figures show the Xbox 360 as the clear winner.

December marks the first month during which all three consoles were on sale for the full 31-day period. November's figures, released by NPD last year, inherently showed lower numbers for the Wii and PS3 as these machines didn't go on sale until the middle of the month.

Adding the numbers for November and December together, you get 1.61m Xbox 360s, 1.08m Wiis and 687,700 PS3s - rather less than the figures quoted late last year for sales from the beginning of November through to Christmas Day, though these would have been early estimates.

Of the recent launches, Wii handsomely beat PS3, but was equally trounced by the Xbox 360. Hindering both Wii and PS3 sales was widely reported supply tightness. Had supply been equal, the Sony and Nintendo console would have shown higher numbers.

Older consoles did well too. Sony's PS2 chalked up 1.4m US sales in December, while 1.6m Nintendo DS handhelds flew off the shelves during the month, compared to 953,200 PSPs. Undoubtedly, all three machines were helped by the difficulties some consumers experienced getting hold of the more advanced consoles from those companies.

Consoles sales totalled $1.6bn in the US in December, up 59.2 per cent year on year. ®