Microsoft has revealed that Xbox 360 sales have topped 30 million worldwide.

The firm today boasted that Xbox 360 has achieved the highest percentage growth in hardware sales of any console so far in 2009, up 28 percent over the same period in 2008.

The community for Xbox Live has swelled to more than 20 million – although it remains unclear how many of these are paying ‘Gold’ subscribers.

The company revealed that consumers have downloaded almost one billion pieces of downloadable content from Xbox Live.

“We’ve always been confident that Xbox 360 offers more entertainment value than any other console on the market, and these latest numbers show that consumers agree,” said Don Mattrick, senior vice president of the Interactive Entertainment Business at Microsoft.

“We expect our growth to continue to accelerate. Our news at E3 next week will underscore our commitment to bringing blockbuster entertainment experiences to everyone and to growing the Xbox entertainment brand globally.”

Microsoft claimed that, over the course of this console generation, US consumers alone have spent $14.5 billion on Xbox 360 at retail – generating $5.9 billion in sales  for third-party publishers.