New PS Plus vs. old PS Plus: what’s the difference between them
How is PlayStation Plus changing?
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Sony’sXbox Game Passcompetitor will soon be here in the form of a revamped PlayStation Plus. The 12-year-old monthly subscription service is to be merged with cloud gaming platform PlayStation Now this June, combining the two into a brand newPS Pluspackage.
The newPS Pluswill give you access to hundreds ofPS5andPS4games from PlayStation Studios and third-party developers. Hundreds more retro titles from the PS1, PS2, and PSP eras will also be available. Cloud streaming will let you try titles without any downloads on console or PC, and time-limited game trials will let you check out select releases.
That’s a lot to take in, and with the service launching this June at three membership tiers, it’s even harder to understand. We’re here to break it down for you, outlining exactly how this upcoming version of PS Plus differs from the current, soon-to-be-sunset service.
There are four main differences you need to be aware of: the inclusion of price tiers, its function as a games-on-demand service similar toXbox Game Pass, unmatched access to retro PlayStation games, and a cloud gaming platform. Now for the particulars.
PS Plus: key facts
What is it?A PlayStation subscription service that’s being massively overhauled. While PS Plus currently grants you multiplayer access on Sony’s consoles and a couple of free games each month, it’s being revamped and combined with PlayStation Now into an Xbox Game Pass rival.
PS Plus launch date: The revamped service will launch sometime this June. No exact date has been announced. It will roll out first in Asia, followed by North America, Europe, and then the rest of the world.
PS Plus price:The service will launch with three different membership tiers, ranging from $9.99 / £6.99 / AU$11.95 per month to $17.99 / £13.49 / about AU$ 23.60. It will also be available in quarterly and yearly subscription packages at a discounted price.
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PS Plus tiers
PS Plus will no longer come as a single package. It will relaunch with three different price tiers: Essential, Extra, and Premium. Each one adds a slice of extra content. We’ve summarised each below, before breaking down their specifics in more detail.
Essential– Provides the same benefits as a current PS Plus membership, including access to PlayStation’s online services and two monthly downloadable games.
Extra– The core of the new service. It adds nearly 400 PS4 and PS5 games to download and play whenever you want.
Premium– The ultimate tier. It adds hundreds more retro games to download and includes cloud streaming.
PS Plus Essential
Benefits(provides the same benefits that PlayStation Plus members are getting today):
Price(the price for PlayStation Plus Essential remains the same as the current price for PlayStation Plus):
PS Plus Extra
Benefits
Price
PS Plus Premium
Benefits
Price
Bear in mind that if you’re a PlayStation Plus member by the time June rolls around, your subscription will automatically transfer to the PS Plus Essential tier.
If you’re a PlayStation Now subscriber when the new service launches, you’ll automatically be upgraded to PS Plus Premium for the remaining length of your subscription for no extra cost.
If you live in a region that PlayStation Now doesn’t currently serve, such as Australia, the tiers look slightly different. In the place of the Premium tier, you’ll have access to PS Plus Deluxe. That will give you access to the same retro titles but not the cloud streaming functionality. It will also be offered at a lower price.
Games on demand
PS Plus will no longer be a service that simply hands you a few free monthly games and grants you access to PlayStation’s online servers. It’s turning into a fully-fledged Xbox Game Pass rival. That means it will look something like Netflix for games, giving you hundreds of games to download and play whenever you like.
You’ll have a lot of options to pick from. Subscribing to the Extra tier will net you access to up to 400 PS4 and PS5 games. Sony says it’ll include blockbuster hits from PlayStation Studios, as well as titles released by third-party developers. There’s no word yet on exactly which games will be included, but Sony has mentionedDeath Stranding,God of War,Marvel’s Spider-Man,Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Mortal Kombat 11, andReturnalwill all be there.
If you take out a subscription for the Premium tier, however, you’ll also receive access to up to an additional 340 retro games, spanning classics from the PS1, PS2 and PSP generations. PS3 games will also be available to play through cloud streaming.
The roster of games will be “regularly refreshed”. We expect third-party games will cycle on and off the platform, just as they do on Xbox Game Pass, while PlayStation-owned games will stay put.
Cloud gaming
Sony’s current cloud gaming platform, PlayStation Now, will be merged with PS Plus as part of the upcoming revamp. The service won’t just be a way of nabbing a few free games each month, but accessing an entire library of games that can be streamed directly to your device.
It will work much likeMicrosoft’s Xbox Cloud Gaming. If you have a PS4, PS5 or PC, and have taken out a Premium subscription to PS Plus, you’ll be able to stream a variety of games across the internet. No need to download them and no need to shell out on fancy PC hardware - like an overpriced GPU. That’s particularly handy if you’re running out of storage space on your console, or haven’t upgraded your PC in several years.
Sony has left a few questions hanging in the air, such as which games will be available for streaming, and whether PlayStation Now’s mammoth collection of 800 games will be expanded upon. Currently, Xbox Cloud Gaming lets you stream only a fraction of its total game count, and requires the use of a controller to play them, even for those that support a mouse and keyboard. Whether PS Plus will do the same remains to be seen.
Remember, when the new PS Plus launches this June, any existing PlayStation Now subscribers will automatically be migrated onto its Premium tier for the remainder of their subscription at no added fee.
Retro games
If you have a hankering for retro games, the new form of PS Plus should appeal. Its Premium tier gives you access to a catalog of up to 340 PS1, PS2 and PSP games to both stream and download. PS3 games will also be available to play but only through streaming.
Sony hasn’t given any details as to exactly which classics will be making their way onto the service, but we expect to see the usual bunch of famed and acclaimed titles. That could include Metal Gear Solid, Ratchet & Clank, Wipeout, Tekken 3, Jak & Daxter, Tomb Raider, Oddworld, Sly Cooper, and olderFinal Fantasyentries.
This commitment to retro games stands in stark contrast to the current version of PS Plus, which rarely, if ever, includes golden oldies among its monthly slate of free games. All the free games it gave out in 2021 were released for PS4, PS5 orPSVR. With this library of retro titles at your fingertips, waiting for a developer to remaster your favorite childhood game for modern consoles might soon be a thing of the past.
The same service, if you want it
But things don’t have to change, not if you don’t want them to. PS Plus Essential, the cheapest tier of the new service, will provide exactly the same benefits as the current PlayStation Plus subscription, for exactly the same price.
If you’re not interested in playing hundreds of games on-demand, have no desire to revisit older releases, and don’t fancy gaming over the cloud, you won’t need to. You can happily ignore the changes being made to PS Plus and carry on using the service just as you ordinarily would.
That means you’ll receive at least two monthly games to download and play for the duration of your subscription, access to the multiplayer components of games, exclusives discounts, and cloud storage for your save files.
Current members of PS Plus will be automatically transferred onto the Essential tier when the new service launches later this year.
Callum is TechRadar Gaming’s News Writer. You’ll find him whipping up stories about all the latest happenings in the gaming world, as well as penning the odd feature and review. Before coming to TechRadar, he wrote freelance for various sites, including Clash, The Telegraph, and Gamesindustry.biz, and worked as a Staff Writer at Wargamer. Strategy games and RPGs are his bread and butter, but he’ll eat anything that spins a captivating narrative. He also loves tabletop games, and will happily chew your ear off about TTRPGs and board games.
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