Electronic Arts has published its fourth quarter results (the three months ended March 31, 2025), which “significantly exceeded expectations” according to CEO Andrew Wilson.
For the full year, EA experienced slight decreases across the board but full game sales grew by 1% to $2.02 billion driven by new releases including Split Fiction and Dragon Age: The Veilguard.
Q4 numbers:
- Revenue: $1.8 billion (up 5.8% year-on-year)
- Net income: $254 million (up 39.5% year-on-year)
- Net bookings: $1.8 billion (up 8% year-on-year)
Full-year numbers:
- Revenue: $7.4 billion (down 1.3% year-on-year)
- Net income: $1.1 billion (down 8% year-on-year)
- Net bookings: $7.3 billion (down 1% year-on-year)
The highlights:
EA’s fourth quarter results “significantly exceeded expectations,” with its CFO Stuart Canfield describing it as a “strong finish” to the full fiscal year.
The firm attributed this success to the “reacceleration of growth” in EA Sports FC, the “continued momentum” of its American Football franchise, over 30% of net bookings growth for The Sims franchise, and the successful launch of Split Fiction.
Developed by Hazelight Studios and published by EA, Split Fiction was attributed as the main driver of growth for EA’s full game sales for Q4 at $384 million (up 48% YoY).
Canfield noted that sales for Split Fiction were “nearly double our expectations”. The game has since surpassed four million copies sold.
EA’s Global Football franchise also experienced record growth, with net bookings of over $1 billion (up 70% YoY).
Live service revenues rose 1% to $1.42 billion following the strength of FC Ultimate Team, College Football Ultimate Team, and The Sims franchise.
The Sims experienced over 30% growth in net bookings for the fourth quarter, the best in the franchise’s history.
This was supported by celebrations of its 25th anniversary, which saw the re-release of The Sims and The Sims 2, alongside a new expansion pack and creator kits.
“This quarter was a strong finish to a pivotal year where we acted decisively – realigning resources, managing costs, and focusing on our biggest opportunities,” said Wilson.
“We took important learnings from Q3 to sharpen our operational discipline, strengthen our execution across the business, and deliver long-term value for our players, communities, and stockholders.”
EA’s Q3 results were “not the financial performance it wanted or expected”, which was mainly due to the “temporary underperformance” of EA Sports FC 25.
Since publishing its third quarter results in February, EA cut around 300 jobs in an effort to “drive future growth”.
Last month, redundancies hit EA-owned studio Respawn with 100 workers affected across its Apex Legends and Star Wars: Jedi teams. The firm also cancelled two “early-stage” incubation projects.
It then announced further cuts primarily affecting EA’s Experiences team, with 200 employees losing their jobs. EA said these layoffs were part of its “continued focus on long-term strategic priorities.”
Looking at its full year results, full game sales rose 1% to $2.02 billion. Canfield said this result was driven by new releases including Split Fiction and Dragon Age: The Veilguard “which offset prior year contributions from Star Wars Jedi: Survivor and softness in FC 25 full game sales.”
Live service revenues dropped 2% to $5.34 billion, though this segment did represent 73% of the total bookings for FY25.
Looking ahead, EA projects further growth for the new financial year with net bookings between $7.6 billion and $8 billion, with revenues estimated to be between $7.1 billion and $7.5 billion.
As for the first quarter, net bookings are expected to be between $1.1 billion and $1.2 billion alongside net revenue projects of between $1.5 billion and $1.2 billion.
“As we look to the next two years and beyond, we are positioned for strong growth driven by expansion across our live services, new game launches, and building global fandom through new experiences,” said Wilson. “In FY26, we are launching two of our most iconic franchises – Skate and Battlefield.”
EA has confirmed that Battlefield will launch “within the fiscal year”, expecting growth to be driven by that franchise alongside its EA Sports portfolio, The Sims, and Skate.
“We are confident in a strong slate of upcoming releases, our strategy to invest in our biggest, long term opportunities, and our focused, well-tested execution approach,” Wilson concluded.