Microsoft took the time to release some figures detailing the number of subscribers to its online service, Xbox Live, prompting Sony to release official stats for PlayStation Network in response…

Twenty three million paying subscribers seems an awful lot...

Of course, this is something a lot of the die-hard single console faithful have been waiting a while to see. While many have pointed to Sony’s PlayStation Network as a solid base that’s been gradually improving over time, the fact that it’s free to all PlayStation 3 owners is the single feature most likely to have a pronounced impact on its figures. By contrast, Microsoft’s Xbox Live offers a for-pay service that is (as someone who has a fair bit of experience with both) just a little bit ahead in terms of both user interface and integration. Still, let’s take a look at the numbers before we go any further.

According to TomsHardware, Microsoft reports that it’s reached the 23 million subscriber mark for its Xbox Live service, with the company making the claim that this makes it “the biggest social network connected to the TV. By contrast, Sony boasts that PSN has somewhere in the region of 40 million subscribers, which is a fairly pronounced jump.

Given the fact that the biggest differentiator between the two services is that one is free, the numbers are fairly interesting. Moreover, Microsoft hasn’t given any detail on how many of its Xbox users are running Microsoft’s free service, Xbox Live Silver.

The numbers might not tell us too much about their respective services, but if nothing else, it seems fairly likely that Microsoft is very likely making a killing off those 23 million subscribers, while Sony sees relatively little from PSN users (really, how much money can advertising in the ghost town that is PlayStation Home bring in?). Still, it’d be a lot more interesting to see some more detail; a bit of information on the average number of users actively using a service at any given time would be very interesting indeed… though it seems neither are likely to give up that gem anytime soon.