Key Takeaways Nex, a little-known Silicon Valley startup, has created a bestselling game console for kids called the Nex Playground.
The console has become one of the hottest toys of the holiday season, selling out on Black Friday on Amazon.
Parents are drawn to the Nex Playground because it encourages movement over sedentary play and includes popular games like “Bluey: Bust-a-Move” and “Fruit Ninja.”
The Nex Playground, a motion-tracking game console for kids, has unexpectedly become one of the hottest toys of the holiday season, despite being made by a little-known Silicon Valley startup called Nex instead of an established toy or gaming company.
According to a new report from The Wall Street Journal, Nex sold 5,000 units of the Playground two years ago and 150,000 last year. It’s projected to sell 600,000 units in 2025 and is on track to do more than $150 million in sales this year.
The Nex Playground is a compact, cube-shaped console that connects to a TV and uses a camera and computer vision to track players’ body movements, turning full-body activity into game controls. Instead of using traditional controllers, users jump, duck and wave to interact with games, making the product an “active play” system that incorporates physical activity into screen time.
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The Nex Playground is priced at $249, which is cheaper than flagship consoles like the $499 PlayStation 5 and $449 Nintendo Switch 2. On Black Friday, the Playground sold out and was temporarily out of stock on Amazon, soaring to No. 1 in the Toys & Games category. It is currently the No. 1 bestseller in plug-and-play video games on Amazon.
The Nex Playground. Credit: Nex
Mat Piscatella, an analyst at market research firm Circana, expressed disbelief that the Nex Playground could become a bestselling product so quickly. “To be completely honest, I didn’t know this thing existed a month ago,” he told the WSJ.
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