PlayStation5 Slim review

The most popular gaming console on the market gets smaller, but does it get any better in the process?

Sony has always offered at least one hardware refresh during every PlayStation generation, so it’s now honoring that tradition by releasing the new PS5 Slim. What can consumers expect of it compared to the original PS5? (Image: The Point)

Established practices are frequently revisited for a reason: they work. Sony refreshing its home entertainment systems at some point of their run, for various reasons, is one such example: it happened with the original PlayStation model and the PSone, it happened with the PS2 and the PS2 Slim, it happened with the PS3 and the PS3 Slim (there was even a “Super Slim”… of sorts), it happened with the PS4 and the PS4 Slim and, well, yeah. It’s happening right now with the PS5 and the PS5 “Slim”, although that more of an unofficial nickname nowadays (the official line refers to it just as the “new-look, smaller PS5”).

Since the only PlayStation revision that was actually slim — for a consumer electronics product — was the PS2 one, the PlayStation5 Slim is not really slim per se, but it indeed is slimmer than the model it’s bound to replace. Question is: it’s slimmer, is it any better?

Yours truly got his hands on the new PS5 model a few days ahead of its European launch and spent some time with it to find out. Here’s what consumers need to know about this version of Sony’s popular gaming system.

PS5 Slim system specifications and capabilities