2024 D&D Core Rulebooks Off to "Strongest-Ever" Start for D&D Books

Dungeons & Dragons got a rare shoutout during Hasbro's 3rd quarter earnings report, with Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks stating that the 2024 Core Rulebooks were off to a record start. Today, Hasbro released its third quarter 2025 earnings report, with Wizards of the Coast propping up the overall revenue for the company. Wizards of the Coast is up 33% YTD, with Magic: The Gathering having a 40% jump compared to last year. However, Cocks also called out Dungeons & Dragons in his comments, speaking to both the Core Rulebooks and D&D Beyond's Maps VTT.

Cocks' full comments (which are admittedly very brief) can be found below:

The refreshed 2024 editions of D&D’s Monster Manual, Players Handbook, and DM Guide are off to the strongest-ever start for D&D books. D&DBEYOND’S new, accessible virtual tabletop has driven weekly traffic up nearly 50% since its September launch.

Hasbro is having a good year, with total revenue up 7% compared to last year. Wizards is expected to be up 36-38% for 2025, largely due to the performance of Magic: The Gathering.

 

[Greg K]

Does anyone have thoughts on Stephen Glicker's (Roll for Combat) take?

 

[Zardnaar]

Does anyone have thoughts on Stephen Glicker's (Roll for Combat) take?

Paraphrase the video?

Big selling first year is often 200k to 300k.

100k sales on release could count as fastest selling ever.

 

[mamba]

Does anyone have thoughts on Stephen Glicker's (Roll for Combat) take?

yes, the guy has no idea what he is talking about, Bookscan numbers are useless for D&D sales

 

[Zardnaar]

yes, the guy has no idea what he is talking about, Bookscan numbers are useless for D&D sales

Maybe not completely useless. We dont know what metrics wotc uses.

60% digital and we dont know if they're using revenue, profit or sales numbers.

Bookscans useful for trends and big selling items. Its useless for overall sales and WotC Financials. We also don't know what % bookscan represents.

 

[Parmandur]

yes, the guy has no idea what he is talking about, Bookscan numbers are useless for D&D sales

Being mistaken about the relevance of bookscan at first is one thing, bit he has juat continually doubled down in spite of all the evidence...

 

[Greg K]

yes, the guy has no idea what he is talking about, Bookscan numbers are useless for D&D sales

He didn't rely on Bookscan. He mentioned it, but at one pointed, he mentioned the limitations of Bookscan for sales now in comparison to 2014.
I am curious about thoughts regarding when he talked about Hasbro's report to shareholders. He discusses
1) How things in the report were worded;
2 )His observation that, following mentions of D&D 2024 having the strongest initial sales of any edition, discussions of sales (profits) are a) regarding Magic or b) the lumping of Magic and D&D figures together when discussing WOTC sales figures. In essence hiding/masking 2024 sales (profits?) if I understood correctly;
3) His analysis of D&D sales figures when removing M:TG out of the lumped sales figures.

 

[mamba]

Bookscans useful for trends and big selling items.

to figure out D&D sales numbers it is literally useless, I might as well guess them myself, I at least have a chance to get close, Bookscan does not.

If you want to compare PHB24 to DMG24 ratio maybe it can work for that, not even sure about that

 

[mamba]

He didn't rely on Bookscan. He mentioned it, but at one pointed, he mentioned the limitations of Bookscan for sales now in comparison to 2014.

so where is the 100k from then?

He mentions how things in the report were worded, how Hasbro mentions D&D 2024 having the strongest initial sales of any edition, but then following Hasbro sales figure discussions are either about Magic or the lumping of Magic and D&D figures together when discussing WOTC sales figures,

they pretty much always do that, Hasbro does not like to share meaningful information

and his analysis of D&D sales figures when removing M:TG out of the lumped sales figures.

not gonna watch the guy, do you have a summary of his analysis?

Teos Abadia usually dives into these quarterly reports to figure out D&D sales. There was some podcast recently where he said the number is between 60M and 70M, but hard to figure out more closely than that as their two methods to do so do not align this time whereas in the past they were a lot closer to each other.

The upper number would be growth, the lower number would not be, compared to the average 66.6M of the 2014 version he was comparing it to, forgot for what timeline that was the average, probably 2023/24 before the new books, but not sure.

In any case, since the comparison was to initial 5e sales, not peak sales, the statement that it is the fastest selling edition is true, but that obviously was expected, anything else would have been a drastic drop in sales, as in complete collapse

 

[Greg K]

so where is the 100k from then?
Yes, he mentioned the 100K and that came from Bookscan, However, at one point he mentioned that, unlike with 2014, Bookscan's figures for 2024 are unreliable as they have issues involving digital sales (and I think he or Mark mentioned something else in addition) which were not present during 2014.

 

[mamba]

your answer is in my quote, so I could not quote it

“Yes, he mentioned the 100K and that came from Bookscan, However, at one point he mentioned that, unlike with 2014, Bookscan's figures for 2024 are unreliable”

they are also unreliable for 2014, they are probably off by a factor of 4 or 5 from the actual numbers… and they are completely pointless with 2024