Four Years In, Sony Is Making PS5 Controllers More Expensive

One of the pricier video game controllers on the market just got even more expensive. Sony has stealthily raised the price of the PlayStation 5 DualSense, the latest example of how it keeps getting more expensive to upgrade this console generation ahead of what many are expecting to be a PS5 Pro reveal later in September.

As first noticed by gaming news and deals account Wario64, several retailers recently raised the price of all PS5 DualSense controllers by $5. Sony’s own storefront for gaming accessories, PlayStation Direct, also shows the base white DualSense going from $70 up to $75, while new color variants and special edition versions like the Concord and Astro Bot-themed controllers have all gotten pricier as well.

What’s especially odd about the news is that it hasn’t come alongside a broader announcement, nor an explanation at the PlayStation Blog as to why the controllers will be more expensive four years into this console cycle, rather than less. In the past, hardware would get cheaper the older it got, with price cuts to the PS3 and PS4 helping new players finally upgrade. But this time around things are going in the opposite direction.

A year ago, Sony announced that its revamped PS Plus program, which is required to play games online, would be going up by as much as $40 a year at the most expensive tier. A couple months later, it revealed a new “Slim” model for the PS5 that raised the price of the all-digital version by $50, with an optional disc drive costing $80 to purchase separately. And just last week, Sony announced the PS5 would be getting a massive price hike of 13,000 yen, or roughly $90, in Japan.

Normally, players who wait to upgrade from one console generation to the next get rewarded with cheaper prices and a bigger library of new games waiting for them. That hasn’t been the case this time around, with many of the PS5's bigger exclusives being cross-gen for longer than expected, and the base PS5 holding steady at $500.

The DualSense going up $5 looks minor in the scheme of things, but the controllers have also been notorious for stick drift issues, and I’ve found myself going through one every couple years just from the rubber nubs rubbing off or pins in the haptic triggers breaking. And because of the proprietary technology, there are no cheap third-party alternatives for the PS5 controller.

The recent launch of Astro Bot has shown how impressive and immersive the DualSense can making playing a game feel when utilized to the max, but for most games, any old controller would do just fine. 

.