Before Thanksgiving, Bloomberg released a report claiming that Sony has a handheld console in "early development." That console is reportedly capable of playing PS5 games similar to the Nintendo Switch.
The future of gaming is handheld, and we've heard rumors that Sony is exploring a true handheld console.
Today, Digital Foundry released a video podcast confirming parts of the Bloomberg report.
“What’s interesting about this is we actually heard about this handheld some months ago from a couple of sources specifically,” said senior staff writer John Linneman in the video. “So, we’re not in the business of leaking things, but it’s interesting that this finally sort of started to make its rounds because it just sort of confirmed what we had seen and heard off the record about this existing, which is cool."
The trio discusses what they think the portable console will feature, mostly about scaling up or down games based on the form factor. This means the games might be slightly less graphically powerful on the handheld version while looking and performing much better when docked or played on the main console.
They believe that, at best, the handheld might natively run PS4 games, but there's no way Sony can get PS5 games to run that way on a handheld with the way the PS5 is built. However, they believe Xbox has an advantage over the Series S system, which is already a scaled-down version of the Series X.
That said, Valve's Steam Deck and competitors from Asus and Lenovo show that powerful and capable gaming is available in a handheld form.
Sony did release the PlayStation Portal earlier this year, which is more of a streaming device that connects to the main console. However, this report appears to confirm a mobile console, like the Switch or Valve Steam Deck.
Handhelds are coming. Xbox's Phil Spencer recently confirmed that the company is in the process of developing an Xbox handheld as well.
The PlayStation and Xbox handhelds are reportedly years away from releasing, which isn't surprising. The PlayStation 6 isn't expected to launch until 2027 or 2028. So, there is time for either company to design and develop a handheld that will probably work with whatever the next generation of gaming looks like.
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