The game sale calendar: every store's dates in one place

Every store discounts on its own rhythm, and nobody shops at only one store. If you own a PC and a console, the useful question is not "when is the next Steam sale" but "what is the next sale anywhere, and is the thing I want going to be in it?" This page answers that. It is one calendar covering Steam, the Nintendo eShop, the PlayStation Store and the Microsoft Store, built from dates the stores actually announced.

There is one thing worth understanding before you read the tables, because it explains their shape. Valve publishes its sale dates in advance, months ahead, through the events calendar it gives to developers. Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft do not — they announce a sale somewhere between a few days and a couple of weeks before it opens. So for Steam we can print real, confirmed dates into the middle of next year. For the three console stores we print the dates that have already run, then an expected window with the specific history it is derived from, clearly labeled as an expectation. We will not invent a date and dress it up as an announcement.

Confirmed next: sales with announced dates

These are dated and public. Anything running on the day this page was last built is marked.

The row worth stopping on is the Steam Autumn Sale. It used to run in the week of US Thanksgiving, overlapping Black Friday. It does not any more. Valve moved it two months earlier in 2025 and has kept it there, so on Steam the pre-holiday sale now lands in early October and there is nothing between it and the Winter Sale in mid-December. If you have been waiting for a Steam Black Friday event, it is not coming — that discount moved to October, and the console stores are the ones that still run a genuine Black Friday.

Expected next: the stores that do not announce ahead

Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft keep their calendars to themselves, so everything below is a pattern read from the dates in the history table further down. Each row states exactly what it is inferred from so you can judge it yourself. Treat these as planning windows, not promises.

What has already run

The history is the useful part, because a store's past dates are the only honest basis for guessing its future ones. This is every sale we have dated so far, most recent first.

Dates checked: 2026-09-03. Announced dates come from the stores' own announcements and are listed as they were published. Expected windows are derived from the dates in the history table above and are clearly marked as expectations — we never print an invented date and imply a store announced it.

The four calendars, in one paragraph each

Steam: the only one you can genuinely plan around

Five seasonal events, of which two matter: Summer in late June and Winter in mid-December, each running about two to three weeks with the whole catalog cut at once. Spring and Autumn are one-week events, shallower and more selective. Because Valve publishes ahead, you can put the next eighteen months in a diary today. Full detail, including the weekly and themed cycle, is in the Steam sale schedule, and how long each event actually stays open is in how long Steam sales last.

Nintendo eShop: constant small sales, two real windows

The eShop always has something discounted — new third-party cuts land most weeks — but Nintendo's own big games barely move at any of them. The two windows where first-party prices genuinely shift are Cyber Deals in late November and the MAR10 Day sale around March 10. Everything else is third-party. The detail, including why Nintendo behaves this way and what Gold Points change, is in the Nintendo eShop sale calendar and how often Nintendo games go on sale.

PlayStation Store: one tentpole, plus Black Friday

Sony runs near-continuous themed promotions, but the two events that reliably move prices are Days of Play in late spring and the Black Friday promotion in late November, which is also the cheapest window of the year for a twelve-month PS Plus membership. Unlike Nintendo, Sony discounts its own exclusives hard once they are a year or two old. See the PlayStation Store sale schedule.

Xbox: the longest sales, and a subscription that changes the math

Microsoft runs the longest events of any store — the Countdown Sale spans three weeks from mid-December into January, and the Ultimate Game Sale takes a fortnight in July. The Spring Sale adds a twist nobody else has: Game Pass members get in before everyone else. Before you buy any Xbox game in a sale, check whether it is already on Game Pass. See the Xbox sale schedule.