PS5 Pro predicted to sell 13 million consoles but UK demand is lower than US-GameCentral-Entertainment – Metro

Fans seem to be buying it anyway (Sony)

Despite suffering the most negative response to a new Sony console ever, analysts predict the PS5 Pro will do no worse than the PS4 Pro.

There’s no doubting that the price of the PS5 Pro console is absolutely outrageous, and that the way Sony announced it did absolutely nothing to justify a £700 price tag, but the simple answer for why it’s so expensive is that some people are willing to pay that much.

That’s not as facetious as it sounds because the console is only aimed at a very niche audience and the older PS4 Pro console only ended up accounting for around 14% of overall PlayStation 4 sales.

Despite the high asking price, analysts predict that the PS5 Pro will be no more or less successful and there’s already evidence that some are getting ready for its release on November 7, given the sudden increase in external disc drive sales for the PlayStation 5.

What makes the price of the PS5 Pro even worse is that it’s a digital-only console and has no disc drive, unlike the PlayStation 4 or the more popular model of PS5 Slim.

Instead, you have to buy the disc drive separately if you want it (or use one from your existing PlayStation 5), which adds another £100 to the price. Not even the vertical stand is free, so that’s another £25 on its own.

As preposterous as that sounds, and rather than refuse to pay Sony’s prices, the PlayStation 5 external disc drive has seen a sudden increase in sales this week and has been as high as #8 on Amazon’s best sellers list – it’s even sold out in some US stores.

In the UK though it’s a different picture, with the drive nowhere to be found in the best seller list. That’s no doubt because the UK price is proportionally much higher than anywhere else in the world.

Not counting taxes, the PS5 Pro is the equivalent of just £535 in the US and while American fans have been complaining about the price as well, it doesn’t seem to have put them off as much.

It’s not likely to in the long run either, at least according to Ampere Analysis analyst Piers Harding-Rolls, who predicts that the PS5 Pro will sell around 1.3 million consoles during it’s ‘launch window’, which is not much less than the PS4 Pro during the same period.

Overall, he predicts the PS5 Pro will sell around 13 million consoles by 2029. There’s no definitive lifetime total for the PS4 Pro but it’s believed to be around 14.5 million.

‘We expect the price point to soften demand with some consumers, but for PlayStation enthusiasts the pricing is less of a consideration,’ wrote Harding-Rolls.

Interestingly, he highlights the idea, as many fans have, that it’s the lack of serious competition from Xbox this generation that has emboldened Sony when it comes to pricing.

‘PS5 Pro pricing reflects Sony’s adjusted strategy to protect its margin, general supply chain inflation and a lack of direct competitor to its mid-cycle upgrade compared to last generation (where Microsoft was preparing the Xbox One X),’ he said.

‘The lack of competition means it is an easier decision for Sony to run with a higher price point to protect its existing margins.’

PS5 Pro – a lack of competition always hurts consumers (Sony)

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