The Xbox Series X, Series S, and PlayStation 5 have all been pretty hard to come by ever since pre-orders opened up a couple of months ago, and at least when it comes to the new Xbox consoles, it doesn't sound like that availability is going to better for a while.
Microsoft has said that it expects shortages of the Xbox Series X and S to continue into 2021. "I think we'll continue to see supply shortages as we head into the post-holiday quarter, so Microsoft's Q3, calendar Q1," Microsoft CFO Tim Stuart explained during the Jeffries Interactive Entertainment Virual Conference this week (via Seeking Alpha, IGN), suggesting that it may not be until April before supply of the new Xbox models starts to meet demand.
"And that's where I start to — I expect to see a little bit of the demand — the supply profile, meeting the demand profile. You'll be outside of a holiday window," Stuart went on to say. "We'll have supply cranking over the next, what, 4, 5, 6 months. And that's when I expect to see really that demand profile start to be met, which will be really, really great."
Xbox chief Phil Spencer has said that the release of the Xbox Series X and S was "the largest launch in Xbox history", with Microsoft selling more new consoles sold within the first 24 hours of launch than it ever had before. Both of the new Xbox models are currently out of stock at all the major retailers and while there are consoles available on reselling sites, they're being priced at least a few hundred dollars above retail.
While there are periodic restocks of the new Xbox Series X and S at retailers, these new statements from Microsoft CFO Tim Stuart mean that anyone in the market for a new Xbox is going to have to continue to watch for these restocks for quite a while.