Good Luck Finding An Xbox Series X Anytime Soon

Gamers who are seeking an Xbox Series X may be out of luck for quite some time. Microsoft recently projected that its brand new console, as well as the all-digital Series S, will continue to experience shortages through the start of 2021, and possibly even the year's entire first quarter.

IGN's Ryan McCaffrey, Destin Legarie, Miranda Sanchez, and Brandin Tyrrel discussed the shortages during the publication's weekly Podcast Unlocked. While attending the recent Jefferies Interactive Entertainment Virtual Conference, Microsoft Chief Technology Officer Tim Stewart stated that the demand for the Series X|S is very high at the moment because gaming is "exploding" this year. "I think we'll continue to see supply shortages as we head into the post-holiday quarter ... We'll have supply cranking over the next four, five, six months, and that's when I expect to see that demand profile start to be met," Stewart said, according to McCaffrey.

Stewart said that Microsoft will likely be working on its Microsoft X|S supply until 2021's second quarter, April to June, which unfortunately means that consumers will struggle to find the consoles from official retailers. In the meantime, people should avoid purchasing the consoles from consumers who buy the systems and then resell them on secondary markets, Tyrrel warned. This is solid advice, as scalpers may be one of the hardest problems faced by next-gen consoles.

Sanchez pointed out that the Series X|S shortage was unexpected, since Microsoft seemed confident in its supply during the pre-order period. As a result, some gamers probably felt safe waiting until after the pre-order period to purchase the Xbox Series X|S, but were ultimately unsuccessful and frustrated when the pre-order supply sold out.

Xbox head Phil Spencer did recently acknowledge and apologize for the Series X|S shortages, noting that Microsoft has remained unable to keep up with the demand at this time. While Spencer did previously predict a shortage at launch, the demand for the Series X|S has been greater than any previous Xbox console, resulting in the biggest launch in Xbox history.

Since its release on November 10, the Series X|S launch has caused quite an uproar between supply frustrations and the lack of exciting current-gen exclusives. On top of that, some gamers found their new Series X systems to have faulty hard drives, while others hit a roadblock when logging in to Xbox Live. It's certainly frustrating for Xbox gamers to miss out on the start of the new console generation, but the supply shortage will hopefully create a chance for Microsoft to fix all the Series X|S's launch day issues before it dishes out a new supply.