Technology
Chart: Amazon’s Dominance in Ecommerce
This Chart Shows Amazon’s Dominance in Ecommerce
It’s no secret that Amazon is dominant in ecommerce.
But despite this being common knowledge, the most recent data behind the explosion in Amazon’s market position is still stunning to behold: in the last two years, the already monstrous Amazon somehow was able to increase their share of the total U.S. ecommerce market from 38% to 49%.
Amazon holds almost half of the massive $252.7 billion market – that’s more than double the market share of the next nine companies (including eBay, Walmart, Best Buy, Apple, etc.) combined!
Leaders and Laggards
Capturing a 50% share of a coveted U.S. ecommerce market is impressive, especially considering Amazon is up against many formidable retailers:
Rank | Company | Market Share (2018) |
---|---|---|
#1 | Amazon | 49.1% |
#2 | eBay | 6.6% |
#3 | Apple | 3.9% |
#4 | Walmart | 3.7% |
#5 | The Home Depot | 1.5% |
#6 | Best Buy | 1.3% |
#7 | Qurate Retail Group | 1.2% |
#8 | Macy's | 1.2% |
#9 | Costco | 1.2% |
#10 | Wayfair | 1.1% |
Retailers like Walmart and Best Buy are collectively throwing billions of dollars to get a foothold online. The competition is certainly fierce, but Amazon has still been able to achieve astronomical growth:
2016 | 2017 | 2018 | |
---|---|---|---|
Amazon market share | 38.1% | 43.5% | 49.1% |
Will Amazon cap out at 50%, 60%, 70%, or beyond?
At this point no one can tell – but regardless of where the growth ends, such a level of dominance has never been achieved in the retail market like this before.
A Prime Driver
Although not as stunning as overall ecommerce market share, the company’s Prime Day numbers also illustrate the vast size and scale of the company.
The most recent rendition of the annual event in July 2018 raked in $4.2 billion of revenue in a 36-hour period, even though the company had well-publicized technical issues that cost the company $72 million.
2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | |
---|---|---|---|---|
Prime Day Sales | $0.9B | $1.5B | $2.4B | $4.2B |
The 2018 event brought a revenue increase of 74% – and Prime Day now generates more sales than Cyber Monday or Black Friday ecommerce sales.
There’s no doubt that the Jeff Bezos Empire is holding strong: with $900 billion in market capitalization, Amazon is now in the conversation to join Apple in hitting the $1 trillion milestone in the coming months.
Technology
Charting Grand Theft Auto: GTA’s Budget and Revenues
Dive into the GTA budget through the years, with GTA VI set to be the most expensive video game of all time.

Charting Grand Theft Auto: GTA’s Budget and Revenues
Over 10 years since the launch of Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V), the second most-sold video game in history, Rockstar Games has announced its sequel GTA VI will be “coming 2025.”
As the anticipation only grows for this next big entry in the franchise, we take a look at the GTA budget through the years. How much have the last two games cost to make, how much have they earned, and how do they compare with the latest entry?
Data for this visualization comes from Statista, TweakTown, and Twitch Metrics.
How Much Has GTA VI Cost to Make?
The GTA franchise has grown enormously in scale from humble beginnings as a top-down, 2D video game in 1997. Fifteen installments later, the upcoming release, GTA VI, is estimated to be the most expensive video game to be made yet.
Here’s a look at how much GTA VI and the last two major releases cost, and how much revenue they’ve earned as of August 2023.
Year | Title | Production Costs ($) | Revenue ($) | Copies Sold |
---|---|---|---|---|
2025 (est.) | GTA VI | $2B (rumored) | N/A | N/A |
2013 | GTA V | $265M | $7.7B | 185M |
2008 | GTA IV | $100M | $2B | 25M |
In 2008, GTA IV cost around $100 million—already a budget that rivalled big Hollywood releases. However with 25 million copies sold, the game earned nearly $2 billion—a five-fold return on its production cost.
Five years later, GTA V (2013) cost more than $200 million to make—twice GTA IV’s budget. A decade after its release, GTA V has generated close to $8 billion, with hundreds of millions in annual revenue from subscriptions and in-game purchases—a model that its successor is sure to follow.
In fact, subscription fees and in-game purchases represented 78% of Take-Two Interactive’s (parent of GTA developer Rockstar Games) revenues in 2023.
Analysts estimate the to-be-released GTA VI’s costs at $2 billion, including marketing and other expenses. A massive open-world (set in the Miami-inspired “Vice City”), cutting edge graphics, and a reportedly brand-new game engine are all reasons for the game’s outsized budget.
For comparison, the current most expensive games to have been made include Red Dead Redemption 2 (also by Rockstar) and Star Citizen, both reportedly with a $500 million budget.
Meanwhile, Take-Two Interactive shares are up more than 50% for the year.
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