Sony’s new PlayStation handheld will reportedly play PS5 games

Sony aims for PlayStation 5 game compatibility with their next-gen handheld

Rumour has it that Sony is developing a new handheld gaming system that will be compatible with PS5 games. According to Bloomberg, Sony’s development of this new handheld is in its “early stages,” and it remains to be seen if this console will ever make it to market.

If true, this means that Sony is working on a successor to their PlayStation Portable (PSP) and their PlayStation Vita. While the new console aims for PlayStation 5 compatibility, the system will likely be a lower-end PlayStation 6 device, not a PlayStation 5 Portable. As such, the device will fill a similar niche as Microsoft’s Xbox Series S, albeit in a portable form.

Effectively, this will be a PlayStation Portal-style device that can play games natively, lacking the need for game streaming. Currently, Sony’s PlayStation Portal can only stream games from a PlayStation 5, though a new beta update has enabled limited cloud game streaming support.

Based on currently available information, Sony is likely to be working on a PlayStation 6 handheld and stronger PlayStation 6 static console. Rumour has it that Sony is considering AMD UDNA graphics and Zen 4 (or Zen 5) CPU cores for their next console. That report also claimed that Sony planned to create an AMD-powered handheld.

(Sony’s PlayStation Portal)

Is a PS5-compatible handheld possible?

If Sony could develop a handheld that can play PlayStation 5 games, it would also be able to run PlayStation 4 games. As such, Sony’s next-gen handheld could launch with a colossal library of available games. That said, delivering PlayStation 5 performance on a handheld would be a challenge.

For starters, Sony’s PlayStation 5 has a huge power draw. It draws around 200W of power while gaming (source). For comparison, Valve’s Steam Deck only draws around 25W of power under load. That means that huge power efficiency gains are required to deliver PS5-level performance on a handheld device. Without these gains, a PS5-compatible handheld would run hot and have an incredibly short battery life.

Can Sony create a PS5-compatible handheld? Maybe. That said, Sony has huge technical hurdles to overcome to make this happen. Microsoft has an easier job achieving this feat, as they only need to deliver greater than Xbox Series S performance to achieve the same backwards compatibility feat. As such, a next-gen Xbox Series-compatible handheld is much more likely to be created.

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