Update: It’s taken an obscenely long time to roll out for everyone, but you should all now have the ability to check for updates on PS5 software in your Game Library. Sony has quietly rolled out the feature without a firmware update, but if you dig into your catalogue of installed software and hit the Options button, you should see the prompt.
Original Article: A baffling PS5 user interface oversight made it impossible to search for software updates if a tile wasn’t showing on your home screen. To illustrate more clearly, if a game wasn’t part of your ten previously played titles, you’d have to load it in order to search for a patch. If there was an update, you’d then have to close the software while it installed.
However, a new update that’s quietly rolling out around the globe will allow you to check for updates on any software installed on your console – including those installed in your Game Library. This means that, if you’re planning to play a game you haven’t for a while, you’ll be able to search for the patch to get it installed before you boot it up.
Now admittedly we haven’t been able to confirm this information at Push Square just yet, because our console isn’t showing the feature. But there are dozens upon dozens of reports all around the web suggesting this is real, so it might just take a little bit longer for the functionality to roll out to everyone. It doesn’t look like a firmware update is needed, so just sit tight and you should get it eventually.
[source reddit.com]
Comments 61
If this is true, it’s a great update. Better get ready for 18tb of updates. Hahahaha.
EDIT: Shame it’s not an auto check. Better than it was, but still not a good fix if you have a lot installed.
Don't games update automatically on PS5 as soon as a patch releases, like on PS4? Why would would there be a need to check for an update?
Finally! This has bothered me for so long. Hey, it’s only taken them three years to sort it, but better late than never.
One other thing that still bothers me, is that the artwork on most game tiles that are in 'Game Library' and at the top of the Home Screen are vastly inferior to the actual tile art that’s displayed in 'Your Collection'. The Spider-Man games, Sackboy, The Callisto Protocol and Hogwarts Legacy are some of the most egregious examples. That’s probably the only area where Xbox Series X|S is vastly superior. What makes the issue worse is that when PS5 first launched, the proper tile art was always displayed. But it changed after an early firmware update.
I adore my PS5, and use it more than my Series X and Switch combined (and then some), but I’m really not a fan of the system’s UI.
Genuine question: does this bother anyone else or is it just me? I think it might be just me.
Another thing that is weirdly missing is the ability to look at update history for PS5 versions of games, if you have a PS4 game installed and on the home screen you can press the options button and look at the patch notes for that game. It's weird Sony hasn't fixed this.
@xDD90x I'm not sure what the conditions are exactly but it seems that automatic patch downloads work only for games you played recently. Which I guess makes some kind of sense.
Now add the ability to delete games from your trophy list that are above 0 percent, folders on the Home Screen, and custom themes. It shouldn’t be this hard, Sony.
I won't say 'finally' until we get folders and themes. So I'll probably never say it.
I dunno but it doesnt workt for me? Also haven't seen any Screenshot of this new feature
Wow, spoiling secrets in the article title. I'm going on media blackout until new PS5 firmware update rolls out.
Only took 5 years for what should be a standard feature. Better late than never though.
Honestly never noticed this, in fact surprised this was a thing, I’ve always been impressed that the games I am playing are updated when I come to play them even if the update was just a hour or so ago E.g. Genshin every 6 weeks is always ready.
@get2sammyb there is a good reason for NOT updating every game however. If you think about the terabytes and terabytes of updates that are never used on most games over a consoles lifecycle, multiplied by 100 million consoles at the end of the gen, and the console manufacturers have a responsibility to reduce the carbon footprint of their machines. It adds up quickly when looked at from the macro level.
My updates for any particular game only seem to start after i start the game or after restoring database, hope this fixes that.
Edit - Should have read article fully...doh.
I wonder if this will get pushed out as a System Feature Update, you can manually check for those in the settings. They're separate to the console software updates and seem to just install silently whenever the console is turned off or restarted.
This is actually pretty nice.
About time! Odd they left it this long.
...and I was wondering that each time I start some game a patch download pop-up...
Wasn't it that at 3am all apps checked and downloaded patches???
I'll blame it on Jim Ryan. Now that he's leaving the patch is getting implemented.
So this will scan everything on my ssd and just tell me if anything needs updating?
@The_Pixel_King You're absolutely right, ive sometimes thought id installed 2 diff versions of a game due to the home screen tile art and the "collection" tile art and yes the collection art looks better.
At bloody last!
That took way too long. Hopefully we the PS4 patch notes soon too. But this really is nice.
@Smiffy01 Honestly, it bothers me quite a bit, man. But at least I now know I’m not the only one! Solidarity in numbers and all that 😊
Back on topic, I wonder when this new feature that allows us to check for updates for games that aren’t on the home screen will go live? My PS5 only just started displaying the new 5-star rating system yesterday!
Nice, now please bring back folders on homescreen 😃
@The_Pixel_King Yeah I hear you loud and clear mate. The worst example by far was Alba: A Wildlife Adventure... the collection tile was a very low res cropped graphic, nothing like the library tile. I tweeted the Devs and eventually (months later) it was rectified. It's nothing new though, even some PS4 games had abstract or logo based tiles, compared to the full game art on the Xbox, eg. Watch Dogs 1-3.
Back on topic, I received a very random questionnaire from Sony two weeks ago, asking what I liked best about my PS4(?!). I listed the features that the PS5 doesn't have, and the ability to update from the library was obviously one of them. I'm sure it was a coincidence, but maybe they listened!...
This is amazing news! I hated going to play a game with friends on a whim and then having to wait for it to update. On a side note, when are they going to patch the bug that auto installs PS4 disc games that you have the PS5 digital upgrade already installed??
That sounds far worse than the PS4. And PS3 for that matter. Games used to just... update.
@IrishNomad the double install thing is something that gets right on my nerves
Sony is about as good as Bethesda when it comes to firmware. My Sony TV crashed about once every hour after an update, and it took over 6 months for them to patch it properly and release a stable firmware.
Also everything was such a mess when the ps5 was released. They also destroyed their own website and made it much much worse.
I'm hoping this is like a library wide check instead of an individual 'Check for Update'...that gets tedious.
An important feature in the previous console not in the new one until now. What is it with UI and these game companies?
@OnceaThief I've heard of the grammar police, but not the illiterate police complaining that people are using proper grammar. What @get2sammyb wrote checks out as proper usage of the English language... 🤣
@Jimboss I mean, the oh so "underpowered and barebones" Switch from the same generation has done it for years (unless I also missed it being a case of later system update, but even then I believe it's been around since before PS5 launch).
Unless Sony used to expect all of your PS5 exclusives to fit on the home scree- gets dogpiled
Only took them 4 years.
@OnceaThief Ah okay! I thought you were being sarcastic, my apologies! 😹
About bloomin time...at last we get some functionality that should have been there from the start...we should not be losing simple user friendly functions when we shell out for the latest console... hopefully they can fix the rest of the mess that is the PS5 UI
Thank goodness. I'd be happier if there was an option to auto-update all installed games, because I really don't understand why that isn't even an option on the PS5. Go use bandwidth at 3am, I'm okay with that.
At least now if I'm considering a couple games I haven't played in a while, I can check to see if there are any updates before I try starting them. It lets me download an update even if I'm not sure that's the game I'm going to fire up, so at least it's more likely to be ready next time.
I'm beginning to wonder if this is just BS as I checked this morning and it was still the same. Obviously this needs to become a reality as the omission of this feature nearly 3 years in is inexcusable, so hopefully I'm wrong and it does actually appear for everybody soon.
@KilloWertz I'm not seeing this feature either. Surely it wouldn't take days to roll this out to everyone?
For those asking questions about why don't all installed games auto-update and why can't this new feature scan all installed games, it's probably the same answer for both - the demand on Sony's servers. For any given game that people actively play, there will be many more that still have it installed but haven't played it in a while. A new 50gb patch comes out and Sony surely want to limit the numbers of people immediately downloading that patch to only the people who really need it, so that they don't get swamped. Similarly if you have many games installed and they made it really easy to check them all for patches, people would just keep downloading patches for games they no longer play just because they can and it's easy.
@IrishNomad @Weebleman That double install still bugs me every time I stick the Diablo cross gen disc into the tub o' lard and it tries to install the PS4 version yet again.
On the subject of auto downloading patches, it's even more annoying because the dopey 5 doesn't have the PS4's download chip, allowing the old stager to download multiple patches in one go. The sluggish 5 seems slower to download PS4 game patches and can only do one patch at once making it impossibly slow as everything else is stuck as 'queued'.
Can confirm the option has appeared for me today, no restart or software update seemingly required.
@JimbobLink No, it wouldn't take this long if it was legit. I waited to respond to give it extra time but it still wasn't there this morning. I'm not saying this will never get added, as it would be ridiculous if it doesn't, but it's definitely not legit yet. Either they are mistaken or they are beta testing.
It's actually mind boggling how much is still missing or is a step down from the PS4 at nearly 3 years into the PS5's lifespan.
@KilloWertz It is legit; see above.
@MrHabushi I'm guilty of not looking at your post above me as put that comment up right before I had get off my laptop. I guess I'm kind of glad I made that comment though as shortly after I turned on my PS5 and the feature was finally there.
I guess for most everybody it finally appeared today. It really is a crucial feature that was missing for no good reason, so I am pretty happy to see it finally be added. It's a feature that should have been there day 1 as not having it made updating some games a real pain, but at least it's there now.
@KilloWertz And it is there. I'm very happy to see it finally added, and very happy to be proved wrong.
@JimbobLink Same here on all accounts. Maybe it wouldn't have suddenly appeared after my comment if I didn't make it. Either way, like I said above, it's great to have a crucial feature like that finally added. It will make updating games much easier.
Now onto that ps5 game streaming, I tried looking for it to run this morning, but it still wasnt on in UK
While PS5 updates are reasonably quick to download and install (using compressed files presumably?) the PS5's total inability to download multiple things at once is still a right royal pain in the rear.
PS4 does it seamlessly, downloading & installing multiple things at once, but the 5 downloads one while all others are 'queued'.
So now my OCD is going to require me to regularly check on all those dormant games in my library, and watch the updates download. Gee, thanks Sony.
But seriously, it's a good and long overdue 'feature'.
very much appreciated.
@The_Pixel_King The other day I installed both Genshin and Honkai just to boot up for some Stars rewards and while they have vastly different library artwork, both install with exactly the same icon that says Hoyoverse at the bottom. It's so dumb.
@Pandalulz Sooooo DUMB! Give us the same icon tile that’s in the library. Why do we have these crap images on our home screens?!
All the games i have installed already auto update. Am i missing something here? Does it tell me if there is an update for games in my library i dont have installed?
Can't make folders, though.
I loved that the PS4 allowed you to put folders on your desktop.
Is there an "Update all" option or do you still have to go game by game like a chump?
@Andee like it doesnt take 2 clicks to search for an update.
its not that big of a deal
@LiquidouSnake I know, but when you've got over a hundred games it does kind of kill the spontaneity of firing up something you haven't played in a while when it requires a massive update — having an "Update all" button that you could periodically click to do a library-wide check would be a great time saver.
Huh, why no Dashboard ability to skin with our own stuff. Hate looking at PS News trash...
Or a better Streaming chat system. Those pop up bubbles suck....
I want a full side bar so I can see chats....
Never asked for this, nor do I care about it....
Really paying attention to the customer base huh...
Oh, and when do we get more streaming choices....I want KICK....Twitch blows, and YT constantly drops....
Typical, they aren't...
@KennethKoerperich88 Kick app on PS? Not happening anytime soon. It won't be allowed until it becomes, for lack of a better term, "advertiser friendly".
I do find it strange that there's still no themes/customization at all.
@The_Pixel_King same issue here, I am puzzled how Sony team with such rich knowledge and experience is unable to implement same solutions as present in previous gens or why this is taking so long to see them coming.
I have to say I loved the PS4 UI so much more. Simple stuff like looking up downloads is a massive undertaking...
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