In the aftermath of the PS5’s price hike, there’s been some discussion from industry analysts about whether Sony’s next-gen console could cost as much as $1,000.
While the figure previously seemed unthinkable, an increasingly challenged economy will push the PS5 Pro’s price up to $899.99 starting next week.
Sure, the platform holder will be making some big margins on its supercharged system, but that’s still a number which raises eyebrows, especially with the PS6 expected to be significantly more capable than its predecessor.
There has been some chatter about whether the new console may be delayed out of its internally intended 2027 release window, but with contracts likely locked with vendors and production lines, it may be more costly for the company to push its next platform back.
Furthermore, there’s no guarantee the economy will rebound in 2028 or 2029, with AI data centres vacuuming up computer components and inflation out of control.
Now, noteworthy hardware snoop KeplerL2 has weighed in with a few new tidbits about the PS6, namely its potential pricing and release window.
Writing on NeoGAF, he revealed that his estimate for the console’s bill of materials may signal some good news:
“My current BOM estimate for PS6 is ~$760, so I would say $699 is still possible with a reasonable subsidy. The question is if Sony will even bother now that Xbox is not direct competition anymore.”
Obviously, this is all personal speculation, so we couldn’t possibly comment on its accuracy. It’s assuming the specs for the next-gen console are now locked, and that there’ll be no further fluctuations to the world economy.
It’s also unclear whether KeplerL2 is accounting for shipping, storage, and retail cuts in his estimates here. These will add to the costs too, which could push the price of his estimate higher.
Assuming this is all accurate, though, you could still be looking at a console for under $1,000, which we suppose is a sweet mercy these days.
As for when the system will launch, the leaker shared a little insight into the difficulties behind Sony’s decision making.
He said:
“AMD could theoretically take the 3nm wafer capacity and use it in other products [if Sony decided to delay] but I’m not sure the demand is high enough since most of their flagship datacenter stuff is actually on 2nm. So, there would probably be some penalty that Sony would have to pay, and wafer prices for a 2028/2029 launch would be even higher.
The only reason for a delay would be hoping for a RAM/NAND price collapse, but as I said before no one knows if/when/by how much prices will come down. So a delay is a bit of a gamble and the safe strategy is actually to launch in 2027 as planned.”
We’re increasingly of the opinion that, if 2027 really is the target for the PS6, then Sony’s going to release the console on time regardless.
How it’s going to market the machine in a challenged economy remains to be seen, but it may be too far along in the process to adjust its plans at this point.