Warner Bros.

How many copies did Mortal Kombat sell? — 2024 statistics

A bloody breakdown of Mortal Kombat stats.

Fact-checked
First Released
October 8, 1992
Genre
Fighting
Developer
NetherRealm Studios
Publisher
Warner Bros.

Mortal Kombat has always been a wild ride, known for its over-the-top violence and unforgettable characters. Each game in the series, from its 1992 arcade roots to the anticipated Mortal Kombat 12 in 2023, amps up the brutal action that fans can’t get enough of. But how’s it doing these days? Let’s break down the Mortal Kombat stats and learn about Mortal Kombat sales, to see the real score on this legendary fighter’s place in today’s gaming world. If you want to learn more interesting things like how many people play video games in the world, we have something to say about that too!

Mortal Kombat key stats

Since Mortal Kombat has been around for a while and there are a lot of games in the series, it is important to start from the beginning and see how many copies the series has sold in total and other important statistics we can get our hands on. Many of you reading this might have played some of the older Mortal Kombat games, so it’s going to be a nice ride seeing how the series started, how it evolved over time, and where it is going in the future.

The Mortal Kombat series sales reached over 73 million copies.

(Sources: VG Sales, VG Chartz, VideoGamer, IGN)

  • Mortal Kombat 11 sold 12 million copies.
  • Mortal Kombat X sales reached 11 million copies.
  • Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance sold 3.5 million copies.
  • Mortal Kombat sold 3 million copies.
  • Mortal Kombat (2011) sold 3 million copies.
  • Mortal Kombat Mobile has over 138 million downloads.

This s perhaps the most important statistic as it gives us a clear perspective on the performance of the Mortal Kombat series as a whole and through these numbers, we can see that this is the best-selling fighting game franchise of all time. You can rarely see complete sales statistics for all of the games in a franchise, so we can’t find all of the numbers, but from what we could find, we can see that Mortal Kombat 11 is the most successful game in the series, having sold 12 million copies.

The Mortal Kombat series revenue reached over $7 billion.

(Sources: VG Sales, GameFAQs)

  • Mortal Kombat X raked in more than $130 million in its first week.
  • The rights for Mortal Kombat were purchased by Warner Bros. from Midway for $33 million.
  • Mortal Kombat is the best-selling fighting game of all time.

Just like the total number of sales, companies do not tend to share their total profits, so we just have speculation and data estimates to look at, but from what we can see, even the approximate earnings of $7 billion are great, although the real earnings of the series might actually be quite higher. The popularity of some of the later games in the series can also be gauged through the sales of Mortal Kombat X which accumulated excellent profits in its first week.

Mortal Kombat 11 played a large role in pushing digital game sales to $8.8 billion.

(Source: VentureBeat)

  • Aside from Mortal Kombat, Fortnite also helped reach this number in digital sales.
  • The digital sales in April 2019 were increased by 7% compared to the period of God of War (2018)’s launch.
  • In 2019, Warner Bros. Interactive revealed that Mortal Kombat 11 had the best launch in the history of the series.

Digital game sales are constantly on the rise because of the convenience of acquiring games through digital means, and the profit that comes from allowing players to purchase games digitally is massive for the gaming industry. We can see that the excellent success of Mortal Kombat 11 and Fortnite pushed the digital sales of the video game industry to over $8.8 billion, which is a huge step in the right direction.

The Mortal Kombat 11 esports scene has awarded $576,390.

(Source: Esports Earnings)

  • The total earnings were distributed through 60 tournaments.
  • The most money was awarded at Final Kombat 2020 with $100,000.
  • The rest of the tournaments had prize pools ranging from $60,000 to $53.
  • The most successful Mortal Kombat player is Dominique “SonicFox” Mclean.
  • He has won $708,185 across all of the tournaments he has played in.
  • He is ranked #233 in the world and #38 in the United States.

Since Mortal Kombat is a fundamentally very competitive series, it makes perfect sense that there has been a lot of activity in the esports industry. However, compared to other games that have a much larger esports presence, Mortal Kombat 11 doesn’t have that many achievements, but it has still awarded a lot of money to its players.

Players have fought 15.5 billion battles in Mortal Kombat Mobile in 5 years.

(Source: Twitter)

  • 5.9 billion faction war battles were fought.
  • 2.9 billion quest missions were completed.
  • 147 characters were released.
  • MKII Scorpion, Klassic Reptile, and Konquerer Shao Khan were the three most-used diamond characters.
  • There were too many uppercuts to count.

The next two lines of stats are going to show you some community performance statistics to see how the community plays the game and how much time it puts into the game on a yearly, and even weekly basis. For Mortal Kombat Mobile, the free-to-play mobile game, we can see that the community completed 15.5 billion battles, which is massive for a mobile game, so we are free to assume that this game is performing quite well and is going to continue doing so for the foreseeable future.

Mortal Kombat X players performed 130 million fatalities in a week.

(Source: Pinterest)

  • The top three picked characters were Scorpion, Sub-Zero, and Raiden.
  • 338 million battles were fought.
  • More flawless victories were achieved than the number of cars made in the United States in a year.
  • Players spent 6,000 years playing the game.
  • Shinnok had the highest win rate.
  • The White Lotus was the most successful faction.

Just like the previous line of stats, this is meant to show the performance of the game in question, and in the case of Mortal Kombat X, we can see that the community is immensely productive, having accumulated over 338 million battles in one random week of the game’s life. Other than that, these stats are exactly like what you would expect for a very popular franchise.

To sum up

FINISH IT! That’s all we have to say about the Mortal Kombat series and everything it has accomplished over its 30-year existence in the gaming industry. We’ve said this before, but this series is a cornerstone of the fighting genre and has established itself as a go-to choice for anyone looking to enjoy a good fighting game. There is a lot more in store for the Mortal Kombat series moving forward, and we can’t wait to report back here whenever something new comes out! We sincerely hope that you have enjoyed what we had to say here and that you have learned something new about this brutal franchise.

Sources

  • “Mortal Kombat”. VG Chartz, 2023, https://www.vgchartz.com/games/games.php?page=1&name=mortal%20kombat&order=TotalShipped&ownership=Both&showpublisher=1&showreleasedate=1&showlastupdate=1&showvgchartzscore=1&showcriticscore=1&showuserscore=1&showshipped=1
  • “Best selling fighting games”. VG Sales, 2023, https://vgsales.fandom.com/wiki/Best_selling_fighting_games#cite_note-22
  • “Mortal Kombat X has sold nearly 11 million copies”. VideoGamer, 2019, https://www.videogamer.com/news/mortal-kombat-x-has-sold-nearly-11-million-copies/
  • “Mortal Kombat 11 Has Sold Over 12 Million Units Worldwide”. IGN, 2021, https://www.ign.com/articles/mortal-kombat-11-best-selling-mk-game-ever-73-million-franchise-sales
  • “MKX generates more than US $ 130 million in first week”. Game FAQs, 2016, https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/802908-mortal-kombat-x/71724757
  • “Mortal Kombat is Now the Best-selling Fighting Game Series in History”. GamePressuer, 2021, https://www.gamepressure.com/newsroom/mortal-kombat-netherrealm-boasts-of-total-sales/z73677
  • “Kombat by Numbers.”. Twitter, 2020, https://twitter.com/mkmobilegame/status/1248628336169017344
  • “Mortal Kombat X Infographics”. Pinterest, 2023, https://www.pinterest.com/pin/38702878026713562/
  • “SuperData: Mortal Kombat 11 and Fortnite help digital game sales hit $8.8 billion in April”. Venture Beat, 2019, https://venturebeat.com/games/superdata-mortal-kombat-11-and-fortnite-help-digital-game-sales-hit-8-8-billion-in-april/
  • “Dominique “SonicFox” Mclean – Fighting Game Player”. Esports Earnings, 2023, https://www.esportsearnings.com/players/4603-sonicfox-dominique-mclean
  • “Mortal Kombat 11”. Esports Earnings, 2023, https://www.esportsearnings.com/games/583-mortal-kombat-11