Sales of PS5 hardware in the US reportedly hit year highs as people flocked to the system to beat the newly-introduced price increases for Sony’s current-generation systems.
The format holder announced in late March that the PS5 and PS5 Pro would see a price increase from April 2, which means the standard version of the console now retails for $649.99, the Digital Edition is $599.99, and the PS5 Pro costs a whopping $899.99. Now, a report by Circana’s Mat Piscatella reveals that consumers wasted no time in snapping up the PS5 ahead of the price increase, with US weekly unit and dollar sales for PS5 hardware hitting 2026 highs during the week ended April 4.
“US spending on video game hardware for the week nearly doubled when compared to the same week a year ago,” noted Piscatella.
This is obviously bucking the normal trend of seeing hardware decreasing in price as time goes on, with the PS5 having seen a major rise in cost now compared to when it first launched in 2020. Sony blamed the increase in price on the “global economic landscape.”
For reference, the standard version of the PS5 had a launch price of $499, the Digital Edition carried a price tag of $399, and the PS5 Pro arrived on the market for $699, so for the latter consumers are now having to fork out $200 more than what they would have when PS5 Pro first released.
[Source – Mat Piscatella on BlueSky via VGC]