PlayStation 5 Pro: Are Minor Upgrades Really Worth Over $1000?

The announcement of the PlayStation 5 Pro has been mostly met with negative reactions from gamers. On the official PlayStation YouTube channel, the video presentation received 133,000 dislikes compared to 90,000 likes, and many on social media are questioning the purpose of the new console.

The biggest issue with the PS5 Pro is its price. What started as a $700 price tag has unexpectedly become €800 (around $883) or £700 (about $915). This doesn’t include taxes, a disc drive, or the vertical stand, which all need to be purchased separately—bringing the total cost to over $1,000.

The presentation itself felt shallow, showcasing either PS4-era games or titles that already run well on the PS5. Comparing Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 on the PS5 and PS5 Pro shows improved sharpness but downgraded shadows, making the upgrade feel less significant.

Some people have blamed inflation for the high cost, but even with just the addition of a disc drive, the PS5 Pro ends up costing nearly as much as the PS3, the most expensive PlayStation console ever, which struggled to sell due to its high price.

Others have compared it to the Xbox Series X, which offers 2TB of storage for $600, arguing that the PS5 Pro offers more for only a slightly higher price. However, they seem to overlook that the Xbox includes a disc drive, and when factoring that into the PS5 Pro’s price, the gap becomes more noticeable.

Technical experts at Digital Foundry criticized Sony for choosing a poor format for the presentation, showing games that don’t face performance issues to begin with. It would have been more fitting to showcase demanding titles like Black Myth: Wukong, Final Fantasy XVI, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, or Immortals of Aveum. Surprisingly, no attention was given to PSSR technology, the main feature of the PS5 Pro, which promises improved 4K visuals.

It’s also worth noting that PS5 sales have dropped significantly this year, from 3.3 million to 2.4 million units in the first quarter—quite low for a console that’s mid-generation. Sony acknowledges this, but instead of lowering the price of the base model after introducing a more expensive version, the company hasn’t taken any steps to boost sales. Most current PS5 owners don’t feel the need to upgrade, and it’s uncertain whether new users will opt for the more expensive Pro model.

If Sony is setting the stage for a higher price tag on the PS6, it risks a similarly slow start to the next generation, just like the PS3 faced.