D&D (2024) 2024 Player’s Handbook is ‘Fastest Selling D&D Book Ever’

It’s only officially been out for a week, but according to Wizards of the Coast, the new Dungeons & Dragons Player’s Handbook has already surpassed Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything to become the fastest selling D&D book ever—in the entire 50-year history of the game. It has sold three times as many copies as the 2014 version of the books did at launch.

Not only that, the 2024 Player’s Handbook was the biggest print run in D&D’s history.

In a press release today, WotC claims more than 85 million D&D fans worldwide, and says that D&D Beyond, the game’s official online platform, has over 18 million users.

 

[Staffan]

It’s the maths that’s made up. Which is why I said maths. If I’d meant WotC’s numbers were made up I’d have said WitC’s numbers. But I didn’t say WotC’s numbers. I said maths. Hopefully it’s clearer now I’ve said maths like 22 times.

If you're gonna do maths, you need to answer: If Jean stands 1 Nm away from Lord Scotland, how tall is Imhotep?

 

[Morrus]

If you're gonna do maths, you need to answer: If Jean stands 1 Nm away from Lord Scotland, how tall is Imhotep?

Orange. Obviously.

 

[bedir than]

PHB 2014 Bookscan numbers in the first four weeks were a mere 39k.

https://alphastream.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/1-Top-sales.jpg

 

[Parmandur]

It’s the maths that’s made up. Which is why I said maths. If I’d meant WotC’s numbers were made up I’d have said WitC’s numbers. But I didn’t say WotC’s numbers. I said maths. Hopefully it’s clearer now I’ve said maths like 22 times.

Maybe not, since I'm not entirely sure I understand what you mean by maths to be honest.

The ratio is not made up, though that is mathematical. I doubt SotC is not counting those 18 million as part of the 85, soooo.

 

[mamba]

18 million is ~21.11764% of 86 million. So I rounded, 1 in 5 give or take.

Those are the numbers we have, and they both seem entirely reasonable.

they also seem very much two unrelated numbers, so I would not give much credence to the 1 in 5 ratio. Sure, that is what the math says, but it is not really a meaningful ratio. It tells us nothing about how many D&D players there are, which is what I was essentially looking for

 

[Velderan]

PHB 2014 Bookscan numbers in the first four weeks were a mere 39k.

https://alphastream.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/1-Top-sales.jpg

Do we know how large the initial print run was for 2014 out of curiosity?

 

[mamba]

Do we know how large the initial print run was for 2014 out of curiosity?

do we know how large the 2024 run is?

 

[Velderan]

do we know how large the 2024 run is?

I haven’t seen anything and doubt we will any time soon. Info like that doesn’t tend to come out quick, if at all. I just figured maybe after 10 years we had something credible, like how @Alphastream dug into the Bookscan numbers to try to figure out overall sales or something.

 

[Morrus]

Maybe not, since I'm not entirely sure I understand what you mean by maths to be honest.

The ratio is not made up, though that is mathematical. I doubt SotC is not counting those 18 million as part of the 85, soooo.

I don’t know what you mean by “the ratio” but if you mean what I think you might mean, it’s completely made up. As are all the weird trains of thought where people are deriving mathematical conclusions from data they don’t understand by applying divisors they’ve invented.

 

[Parmandur]

I don’t know what you mean by “the ratio” but if you mean what I think you might mean, it’s completely made up. As are all the weird trains of thought where people are deriving mathematical conclusions from data they don’t understand by applying divisors they’ve invented.

WotC provided two numbers, one of which is a superset of the other. The 18 millions is probably more concrete, since they have a databae of account, while the 85 million is probavly based on some sort of market research...but they are related. WotC does really believe they have 4 times as many "fans" (however that is measured) that are not signed up for Beyond as they do who actively have an account.