Sony has finally lifted the lid on the PS5 Pro

Today, Sony has revealed the PS5 Pro, an upgraded version of its current-gen console. It’s the PS5 we already know and love, but with much more powerful innards… and an eye-watering price tag. But we’ll get on to that in a bit.

In a nine-minute video, Mark Cerny introduced us to the PS5 Pro, which enhances the experience of playing PlayStation 5 games in three specific ways — what Cerny calls “The Big 3”.

First, its larger GPU (which is up to 45% faster) offers more power for games and their developers to use. Second is advanced Ray Tracing, which uses a streamlined and accelerated approach that equates to a calculation speed that’s double or triple the current PS5. And finally, it will make use of “PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution”, an AI-driven method of upscaling specifically designed for the PS5 Pro. Think AMD’s FSR or Nvidia’s DLSS.

Together, all those factors mean your games will look and play better than ever. With the PS5, Sony’s goal is to narrow the divide between fidelity and performance modes in games. It’s been designed so we don’t have to choose between frames-per-second or the best visuals: we can have both. We can have our cake and eat it, so to speak.

But it comes at a cost. A very big one. Are you ready for this? The PS5 Pro will cost £699.99. Seven hundred pounds. That’s practically twice the cost of a digital edition PS5.

And at £699.99, you’re getting a digital version of the console: a disc drive is available separately, which retails at around £100. If you’ve got a PS5 Slim with a disc drive, you’re already set, because you can simply attach it to a PS5 Pro instead. But if you’re planning on upgrading from an OG PS5, you’ll need to purchase a disc drive if you want to play your physical games.

There is some good news: The PS5 Pro will ship with a 2TB SSD installed as standard, which is about three times the size of the SSD in an original PS5. You’ll also get a DualSense controller and, of course, Astro’s Playroom pre-installed.

Eye-watering cost aside, it is going to be nice to be able to play games at their best possible quality, with both sharp visuals and a steady, fast framerate. Whether it’s going to be worth it for many players, though, remains to be seen. We’d argue that unless you have a huge TV, you’re not going to really benefit from the additional clarity offered by PS5 Pro. Certainly not to the extent that warrants a £699.99 purchase. But that’s a call you’ll have to make yourself.

Watch the PS5 Pro presentation below:

In the Technical Presentation, we got a glimpse at a number of games running on PS5 Pro, showing off improved visual fidelity. It’s hard to get a true picture of how these games will look when watching a stream on YouTube, but it’s nice to know that Sony is including both first and third party games in its sizzle reel.

Amongst those games are Spider-Man 2, Final Fantasy XVI, Horizon Forbidden West, Last of Us Part 2, Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart, Ghost of Tsushima, Gran Turismo 7, Hogwarts Legacy, Control, The Crew Motorfest, Dragon’s Dogma 2 and more.

Now for the most important bit: the PS5 Pro will be available on 7th November. Pre-orders will open on both PlayStation Direct and third-party retailers on 26th September.