Handheld gaming is bigger now than ever, thanks to the Nintendo Switch (and soon-to-be Switch 2) and the Steam Deck. While these portable devices are not as powerful as the best video game consoles, their convenience and relative power make them ideal for anyone who is on the go, shares a TV, or just wants to play from the comfort of their bed.
Xbox has already made its plans clear about its own handheld, but many thought PlayStation had given up on the market after the Vita. It would later release the PlayStation Portal, which can be used for remote play or cloud streaming, but can’t play games natively. Now, we have reports of a true PlayStation portable system on the way. Grab your UMDs and chargers while we talk about everything we know about the next PlayStation handheld.
Release speculation
Rumors and speculation about a PlayStation handheld have been swirling for a while, but the first credible reporting on it came from Bloomberg, which spoke to anonymous sources familiar with the matter. In this article, we learn that Sony Interactive Entertainment is in the “early stages” of developing this new handheld. Bloomberg concludes that the device is not only years away but is still early enough that it could even be canceled.
With so little to work with, this feels like a 2028 product at the earliest, assuming it comes to market at all.
PlayStation handheld news and rumors
Another detail we learned from the Bloomberg report was that the concept of the new PlayStation handheld would not be a streaming device (or at least not exclusively) and be able to play PlayStation 5 games natively. Insider Gaming’s Tom Henderson corroborated this theory in an X post in which he said: “I didn’t think of reporting on this yet because it seemed obvious, but yeah, PlayStation is in the early stages of developing a native PS5 handheld. Development started following the PlayStation Portals release, which surpassed Sony’s expectations.”
This means, should these two sources be correct, that this new PlayStation handheld would be powerful enough to run PS5 games. They could be at a reduced resolution and frame rate, but having that library of titles on a handheld would make it a strong competitor in the space. This may line up with another old rumor that suggested that Sony was developing two new chips for next-gen. One would be for the PS6, while the other was speculated to be for some sort of handheld.
Previous rumors suggested the handheld would only play PS4 games, which might still be possible if it can run PS5 games.
What is still up in the air is whether this PlayStation handheld will accept physical media. The Steam Deck is completely digital, while the Switch accepts SD cards. However, PlayStation faces a unique problem in which it would need a disc drive in order to play PS4 and PS5 games, which likely wouldn’t be realistic. Odds are this will be a digital-only system as well one that allows you to access and download games from your PSN account.
Price, hardware, and design
Pricing this potential PlayStation portable is difficult, but if we assume that it will be able to run PS5 games then it will probably be quite expensive. If Sony is able to get costs down and really aim for being affordable, it could be around $400. It is possible it could be a bit more or less, with things like battery and screen type being major factors, but we already see that base PS5 console costs are not going down. A PlayStation handheld would need to at least be cheaper than the current PS5 for most people to invest, but how far below that point Sony can get is too hard to tell this far off.
The Bloomberg report suggested that this new PlayStation handheld is being based on the PlayStation Portal, so it should look fairly similar. As we discussed in the Xbox handheld article, most handheld consoles now follow a mostly standard hardware design. For PlayStation, the key difference will be that the controller portions will likely keep all that haptic functionality like the DualSense and Portal. For a screen, if it can match the 8-inch screen the Portal has, that should be plenty big for most. OLED would be great for an option as well, but would also come with a higher price tag.