Following the launch of the PlayStation 5 Slim in November of 2023, console fans haven’t wasted any time in trading rumors about a possible PlayStation 5 Pro that’s rumored to be on its way this year.
As the name would suggest, the PS5 Slim was a smaller, lighter console that still packed a punch, offering increased storage and a detachable disk drive to boot. However, that’s nothing when compared to the potential power of the rumored PS5 Pro. Based on what we know so far, here’s a closer look at the PlayStation 5 Pro release date, the specs, and the possible price.
When is the PlayStation 5 Pro release date?
There’s no clear release date for the PlayStation5 Pro – mainly because Sony hasn’t officially released it yet but that doesn’t mean we can’t make educated guesses. Most gaming tech insiders seem to agree that the rough window for a release date is September 2024, as reported by Hypebeast, or at the very least in the second half of the year.
“There seems to be a broad consensus in the game industry that Sony is indeed preparing a launch of a PS5 Pro in the second half of 2024,” Serkan Toto, CEO of Tokyo-based games consultancy Kantan Games, told CNBC on February 20.
This would line up logically with the planned release of Grand Theft Auto 6 in 2025. Sony is sure to want a flashy console to pair with arguably the most highly-anticipated game of the decade. What better than a souped-up upgrade to its latest iteration of the PlayStation?
What is the PS5 Pro price?
Much like the release date, much of the chatter around a potential PlayStation 5 Pro price is speculative. However, this isn’t the first time Sony has released a Pro console following a Slim version. The company did just that back in 2016 with the PlayStation 4 Pro.
Back then, the Pro console cost $100 / €50 / £50 more than the Slim version. By that logic, we might expect the PlayStation 5 Pro to cost in the region of $599.99 / £529.99 if we just hike up the Slim’s price of $499.99 / £479.99. However, consoles, in general, were less expensive back in 2016. For a 2024 console, it’s possible that the console could be even more expensive, reaching over the $600 mark.
Sony might also employ a price hike for the PS5 Slim, perhaps dropping the price of the PS5 baseline down to $399 for the disk version and $49 for the disk-based SKU to $449. Adding $100 on top of that to account for the PS5 Pro would settle it at around $549.99.
Of course, we won’t for certain until we get a formal reveal from Sony. However, it does give you a rough idea of what to expect to pay for the rumored console.
What are the PlayStation 5 Pro specs?
An area where there are more industry rumors to go on is specs. The ‘Pro’ in PlayStation 5 Pro means we can likely expect some beast mode power to come. It’s reported by industry sources via the YouTube channel RedGamingTech that the PlayStation 5 Pro will feature eight-core Zen 2 CPUs (clocking in at 4GHz), an RDNA 3 GPU at 2.8 GHZ, and 16GB of 18,000 MT/s GDDR6 memory with a bandwidth of 587 GB/s.
That’s a pretty significant upgrade to the Slim, which boasts a still-respectable eight-core custom AMD Zen 2 at 3.5GHz and AMD RDNA 2 at 2.23 GHz – although the same memory stats. All in all, it would represent a decent boost in performance.
Specifically, image quality is believed to be a major focus for the PlayStation 5 Pro, with gaming insider Tom Henderson writing on Key to Gaming that he had heard the new console would “[target] improved and consistent FPS at 4K resolution” and “a new ‘performance mode’ for 8K resolution, and accelerated ray tracing.”
Currently, no games support 8K resolution, but this would mark Sony’s continued futureproofing for when that’s the norm that started with the baseline PS5.
Hypebeast also reports that the PS5 Pro will be kitted out with Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS)-style technology developed in-house by Sony. Developed by Nvidia, DLSS refers to a family of real-time, deep-learning image enhancement and upscaling technology that offers another level of visual quality, only available via Nvidia’s RTX line of graphics cards. With the launch of the PlayStation 5 Pro, it seems that Sony might be coming out with its own proprietary technology to rival that of its competitor.
In practical terms, these tech boots would result in a clearer, faster experience for PS5 Pro gamers. Faster memory and CPU clocking speeds would reduce the slow load times many PS5 critics complain about. Games could load near-instantly, perhaps offering a chance for the PS5 Pro to copy a feature from the Xbox Series X/S known as ‘Quick Resume.’ The console allows multiple games to be suspended at once, so players can quickly jump from game to game, returning directly to where they left off rather than clicking through the traditional start screen.
Featured image: Sony
