Sony is raising PlayStation 5 prices again, this time by between $100 and $150
The memory and storage shortages and price hikes that began hitting PC components late last year have gradually trickled down to all kinds of consumer technology: Some products have disappeared, gone out of stock, or been delayed, and others have suffered multiple rounds of price hikes.
Today’s bad news comes from Sony, which is raising prices for PlayStation 5 consoles in the United States just eight months after their last price hike. The reader-free digital edition will increase from $500 to $600; the base PS5 with optical drive will increase from $550 to $650; and the PS5 Pro goes from $750 to $900. At the start of 2025, these consoles cost $450, $500, and $700, respectively.
Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo had all announced one or more price increases for one or more consoles throughout 2025, although these were driven more by the Trump administration’s tariffs on imported products than by the shortage of components. Game console price cuts had already become less common during the 2010s, making consoles like the PS5 more than 5 years old historically expensive compared to older consoles at that point in their lifespan.
RAM and flash memory chips are in short supply, mainly due to demand from AI data centers: Memory makers have shifted production toward making the type of memory found in AI accelerators like Nvidia’s H200, leaving less for the consumer market.
And the situation is unlikely to improve anytime soon, barring a major shift in AI industry demand. Manufacturers like Kioxia have said their capacity is already exhausted through the end of 2026. The complexity of chipmaking means it takes months or even years to ramp up additional manufacturing capacity, and chipmakers may be slow to do so because they don’t want to end up with a glut of memory that they can’t sell if market conditions change. In the short to medium term, all this means is that these high prices will likely persist for some time.
