Will Sony's PlayStation 6 Cost Half As Much As Microsoft's Next Xbox Console?

After months of musing by leakers and insiders, the rumor mill is convinced that the PlayStation 6 could end up coming in at half the price of the next-generation Xbox console—rumors that, if proven to be true, could mark Sony and Microsoft effectively trading places in the historic Xbox 360 vs PlayStation 3 launch pricing battle. For the newly-initiated or those who simply no longer remember, the Xbox 360 launched at $299.99 USD for the no-storage "Core" model and $399.99 USD for the 20 GB "Premium" model while PlayStation 3 launched at $499.99 USD for the 20 GB model and $599.99 USD for the 60 GB model. Adjusted for today's inflation, that starts Xbox 360 as low as $480 and PlayStation 3 at $800.

Now, leaker Kepler_L2 is projecting a price of US$600 for the PlayStation 6, while claiming that the next-gen Xbox is targeting a price point as high as US$1200. If we consider how badly PlayStation 3's price point hurt it in the early part of that generation despite the PlayStation 2 dominating the prior console conflict, that situation looks pretty tough for Microsoft. Previously, we covered alleged leaks from Moore's Law is Dead claiming that the AMD Magnus APU inside the next-gen Xbox would be more powerful than the PlayStation 6 and push it to US$1000. MLiD also believed that the PlayStation 6 would target US$800. These new estimates point toward a very different approach in console hardware between Sony and Microsoft, even though they're both based on the same next-gen AMD architecture.

As Kepler posits, Xbox can no longer sell its next-generation console at a loss since it will provide access to third-party storefronts and thus can't subsidize its console pricing with game sales. This seems to be why his estimate is higher, pegged at $1200 instead of MLID's $1000 estimate. Meanwhile, PlayStation looks to be following the same walled garden approach it always has, so it likely is willing to sell at a loss, leading to Kepler estimating $600 instead of MLID's projected $800. Based on the Xbox Ally simply being an Xbox-branded Windows 11 handheld and Xbox's prior "Everything is an Xbox" comments, this logic does track to an extent.

But is it winning logic for Xbox in today's hyper-competitive gaming marketplace? Unless the next-gen Xbox proves truly competitive with PCs in its price range and eats up a substantial amount of the PC gaming market, probably not. There are justifications for the PlayStation 3's launch price point when one considers it shipped with built-in storage, Blu-Ray, and Wi-Fi support while equivalent adapters for 360 would raise the price point substantially, not to mention free online play versus the subscription-based Xbox Live at the time. The PlayStation 3 also had certain hardware advantages over the Xbox 360, but the oblique nature of the Cell architecture resulted in most third-party games being quicker to develop and easier to run on Xbox 360 hardware instead. If the next-gen Xbox costs more, it will be primarily because Microsoft is betting on more powerful hardware and a more open platform—but it's making that bet from a distant third place in the home console market, not off a historic victory like Sony's PlayStation 2.

At the end of the day, these pricing details and hardware specifications remain purely speculative until we see official confirmation of these details. As much as some people inside and outside the industry may trust @Kepler_L2 and other such leakers making these comments, things can always change between development and release. If Microsoft really chooses to go through with this launch pricing, and Sony gets to undercut the next Xbox by a whopping US$600 instead of just US$200, the next generation may be won before it's even begun. Even MLiD's estimation does not bode well for Xbox, and higher pricing for Xbox consoles and plans have already seen historic backlash.

Image Credit: PlayStation