Pretty much everyone with a brain and a knowledge of video game history acknowledges that Mario is the No.1 video game icon in the world. He’s been around since 1983 (officially…he was Jumpman in the first Donkey Kong arcade title), and he’s been helping lead the charge in video games ever since. What people sometimes forget, though, is that between his 2D and 3D titles, his RPG series, the various spinoff titles, and the games starring characters like Luigi, Peach, and DK, his franchise has a FAR reach, and when you bring it all together, it leads to an incredible stat.
As noted by Insider Stealth below, when you bring all of Mario’s games together, from the mainline to the spinoffs, he’s almost sold ONE BILLION UNITS!!! Here’s the breakdown:
The Mario series is close to being the first video game series to sell 1 billion units:Mario Series Sales – 960+ millionSuper Mario – 446+Mario Kart – 195+Mario Party – 87+Donkey Kong – 85+Mario Sports – 46+Mario RPG – 41+Luigi's Mansion – 26+Other Mario Games – 37+
— Stealth40k (@stealth40k.bsky.social) 2025-08-13T10:21:17.013Z
Here’s the thing that’s arguably even more interesting. There’s literally no doubt that he’ll get to one billion, and that he’ll get there soon enough. The reason we know that is Mario Kart World has already sold 6 million units since the Switch 2’s launch in June, and it’ll be one of the “default” games that new system owners get when they buy the console.
Then, there’s Donkey Kong Bananza (read my review!), which is one of the only exclusive games on the Switch 2, and thus is likely to do incredibly well both this year and beyond, especially with all of the “Game of the Year buzz” surrounding it.
Not to mention, we WILL get more games starring everyone’s favorite plumber and his allies as the Switch era continues. Thus, that one billion mark will grow quite a bit by the time the system’s lifetime ends.
