PlayStation 6 Price Update Is Bad News For The Next Generation

Published Oct 19, 2026, 6:08 AM EDT Tom Wilson is a Gaming Features Writer at Screen Rant. Over the past five years, Tom has worked as the Editor-in-Chief at The Game Crater, as a Staff Writer for GamingIntel, a List Writer at TheGamer, and, of course, as a Senior Writer at ScreenRant. Tom has experience writing reviews, guides, news, and features, and has been responsible for teams of writers, training them and editing their work. Tom graduated with a Masters in Multimedia Journalism, and has since gone on to build up his portfolio of games journalism work. There have always been concerns about the next generation of consoles, specifically the PlayStation 6. There is the incremental improvement of video game graphics rendering a new generation largely redundant, the slow pace of game development resulting in fewer exclusives and thus fewer reasons to invest in a new console, and the high price enforced by ongoing real-world complications prohibiting the vast majority of consumers from purchasing it. However, it is perhaps this latter point that proves to be the most damning, the very thing that will truly determine the fate of Sony's new console. Even if it produces a vastly superior image and is packed with new exclusives, the PlayStation 6 will simply collect dust in warehouses should its price point not meet the realistic expectations of consumers suffering from a seemingly endless cost-of-living crisis. Unfortunately, the PlayStation 6's controversial price just got another update, and it is looking as dour as it always has, a stark realization that feels as if it foretells the end of casual gaming as we know it. The PlayStation 6's potential price point has been fluctuating for quite some time, with analysts, leakers, and the like all throwing their hat into the proverbial ring with figures based on estimates or hearsay. However, by collating all of this information and various reliable reports, we can likely accurately gauge just how much the PS6 will cost. Unfortunately, it would appear that previous estimates, made prior to the boom in AI and the sudden price hike in assorted hardware, are wrong, with new figures pointing to the PlayStation 6 costing $1,000 or more. This is based on a new leak from renowned hardware leaker KeplerL2. This leaker has been revealing information regarding the PS6 and its purported costs for quite some time, initially claiming it would cost the consumer around $699.99, a subsidized cost based on now-antiquated production costs of $760. KeplerL2 later revealed that the cost to make a PS6 had risen dramatically to $960 as a consequence of AI companies' stranglehold on the necessary parts. Now, in a recent NeoGAF forum, KeplerL2 said that the cost of "RAM + NAND alone is over $680." This, coupled with the fact that Sony previously stated (as reported by VGC) that it doesn't plan on "selling hardware at significant losses" and that customers should "fully understand the value we provide in relation to pricing," likely means that we're looking at a $1,000 next-gen console, at the very least. RAM and NAND only cover the console's memory, which, while a significant part of the material costs, doesn't include other requisite components such as the GPU and CPU. Even if Sony were to subsidize the cost, it would still cost the consumer nearly double what the PS5 did back in 2020. With analysts seemingly unanimous in agreeing that the cost of the PS6 could exceed $1,000, the future of next-gen gaming is looking bleak. Of course, Sony could push back the PS6's tentative release date of 2027, but that could end up costing it a fortune, something it may likely look to offset by simply shipping the console at a prohibitively high price. It remains to be seen what Sony's next steps will be, although one can only imagine it is desperate to recoup a little goodwill after burning it all with its physical media debacle. Perhaps the PlayStation 6 will be impressive enough to warrant the price tag, but for $1,000, simply offering a console that produces better visuals and faster load times won't be enough, as the PS5 and its Pro model have more or less been doing that for over half a decade.