Just last August, Sony raised the prices of PS5 consoles in the US, blaming the “challenging economic environment”. Today it has slightly changed the phrasing to “continued pressure in the global economic landscape”, but the result is the same: prices rise everywhere, this time even the PS Portal handheld is being affected.
Starting April 2, the price of a standard PS5 (the one with the disc drive) is going to go up to $650. That’s a massive increase of $100, or $150 if you go back before the August price surge. The digital version has been seeing a similar increase since August, from $500 to $600.
But the most shockingly big bump goes to the PS5 Pro, which will now cost you $900, which is $150 more than its (already very high) previous $750 MSRP. If you managed to buy a Pro during last year’s Black Friday sale, when its price was dropped to $650, you’re probably feeling pretty comfortable right now.
Even on the PlayStation Portal it’s getting a $50 increase, from $199 to $250. Portal has become much more capable over the past 12 months, but $250 for a device that can’t run basically any games may be hard to justify the purchase for many people.
In a blog post, Sony acknowledged the impact of the price increases on its viewers, but said after “careful evaluation” that it was “a necessary step to ensure we can continue to provide innovative, high-quality gaming experiences to players around the world.”
The global economic turmoil is affecting the entire sports industry at the moment. Valve has already pushed back the launch date for the Steam Machine, while the ongoing RAM crisis could also be responsible for the Steam Deck stock shortage.
Microsoft also raised Xbox prices twice last year, and earlier this week Nintendo announced that some of its physical first-party Switch 2 games will soon be more expensive than purchasing games digitally. Although Nintendo has used this type of pricing structure before, this may point to the increasingly prohibitive costs of making and shipping products right now.
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