Sales on Marvel’s X-Men #1 (written by Brian Wood and art by Olivier Coipel), the best-selling comic in comic stores in May, topped 177,000 (see "Top 300 Comics--May 2013"), as befits the over-all #1 team since the advent of the comic store market.  Batman #20 held strong at #2, with a low single digit slip to around 129,000 copies. 

Justice League #20 slipped below 100,000 in the third slot.  In fact, there were only two books over 100,000 in May, reflective of a light month for launches or major events.  Image Comics' The Walking Dead #110, clocking in at the 13th spot, was down from the previous month (about 13,900 copies) and coming in at #24 was the debut of J. Michael Straczynski's Ten Grand #1 with a little over 57,000 copies.

Over on the graphic novel side (see "Top 300 Graphic Novels--May 2013"), no books cracked 10,000, although the first Adventure Time OGN (Adventure Time Original Graphic Novel Vol. 1:  Playing with Fire), from BOOM! Studios, came close at around 9,500.  Also, BOOM!'s Adventure Time: Marceline & The Scream Queens Vol. 1 sold close to 4,800 copies.

Perhaps the most interesting number among the top graphic novels was 7,552, the number of Saga Vol. 1 that sold in its eighth month.  That’s 65% more than April’s sales, and the most in any month since January.  Saga Vol. 1, being priced at $9.99, has now sold over 53,000 copies to North American comic stores since release last October.  Saga also moved up in the book market in May (see "May BookScan--Top 20 Graphic Novels").

Here are ICv2’s estimates of the North American sales of the top 25 comics sold through Diamond Comic Distributors in May of 2013:

177,633                 X-Men #1
129,039                 Batman #20
  97,676                 Justice League #20
  96,664                 Age of Ultron #7
  95,522                 Age of Ultron #8
  93,656                 Superior Spider-Man #9
  85,346                 Superior Spider-Man #10
  83,283                 Justice League of America #3
  80,582                 All New X-Men #11
  78,252                 Detective Comics #20
  78,006                 Iron Man #9
  77,856                 Justice League of America #4
  76,455                 The Walking Dead #110
  75,655                 Uncanny Avengers #8
  74,978                 Avengers #12
  73,621                 Uncanny X-Men #6
  72,514                 Uncanny Avengers #8AU
  70,687                 Avengers #11
  67,414                 Green Lantern #20
  67,262                 Thanos Rising #2
  65,222                 Batman and Red Hood #20
  59,362                 New Avengers #6
  57,298                 Batman Incorporated #11
  57,216                 Ten Grand #1 (MR) [*]
  53,415                 Aquaman #19

For an analysis of the dollar trends in May, see "'Adventure Time' Is #1 GN in May."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books shipped during May, see "Top 300 Comics Actual--May 2013."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels shipped during Maay, see "Top 300 Graphic Novels Actual--May 2013."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books shipped during April, see "Top 300 Comics Actual--April 2013."
For an overview and analysis of the best-selling comics and graphic novels in April, see "An Image #1 Tops 100K."  For an analysis of the dollar trends in April, see "'Jupiter's Legacy' Debuts at #3."

For our index to our reports on the top comic and graphic novel preorders for January 2000 through May 2013, see "ICv2's Top 300 Comics and Top 300 GNs Index."