Josh has been playing video games for longer than he can remember, kicking things off with a Master System before upgrading to a Mega Drive. Covering the industry since 2018, if a game has a strong story – or even better, the decisions you make determine the course of that story – odds are he’s going to like it. Or, you know, put Sonic or Pikachu on the cover and that’ll get his attention too.
It’s officially 2026, happy new year, everyone! A time for fresh starts and new beginnings, and for PlayStation Plus, 2026 kick starts a new era that’s our best indicator yet that, more than five years on from the launch of the PS5, the PS4 is finally being left behind.
It has been almost a year since PlayStation revealed what it had planned for PS Plus in 2026, so it’s understandable if you’ve forgotten those plans. It quietly confirmed almost a year ago that, starting in 2026, the games it gives away to PS Plus Essential subscribers will, for the most part, be PS5 games as the subscription service leaves its PS4 era behind.
PS4 Games Will No Longer Be Included With PS Plus Essential Every Month
From the launch of the PS4 in 2013 until last month, PlayStation has included at least one PS4 game in the games it gives away with Essential each month. A streak that stretches back so far, it predates the cheapest tier of the service being renamed Essential by almost a decade. As more and more gamers have traded their PS4s for PS5s, PlayStation clearly believes it has reached a tipping point where it no longer needs to entice PlayStation owners to subscribe to PS Plus using PS4 games anymore.
It’s unclear how many people are still actively using their PS4s, and even more unclear how many PS4 owners are still claiming their free games each month. PlayStation has the raw data, though, so it’s likely this decision has been made with those numbers in mind, and that there are finally more active users on PS5s than PS4s.
Every game added to Essential, Extra, and Premium and the dates you’ll be able to play them for free.
84 Million People Have Bought PS5s Since 2020
What we do know is how well the PS5 has sold, and despite recent price hikes that have resulted in the console costing as much today as it did when it launched in 2020, its sales are strong. The PS5 has sold 84.2 million units, which places it comfortably among the ten best-selling consoles ever. The next time PlayStation updates that number, it will have almost certainly overtaken the PS3 and be chasing down the Nintendo Wii, which, with 101 million sold, is the seventh best-selling console of all time.
While it’s going to be a big loss for those of you with PS4s who continue to claim the Essential games, you won’t be left behind entirely. PlayStation did note that last-gen games will still occasionally be a part of its Essential tier, it’s just not guaranteed anymore. If that’s no longer enough, rather than scrap PS Plus altogether, I’d recommend making the step up to Extra if you haven’t already. That gets you access to a wide library of PS4 games that is added to each month. That tier will continue to get more PS4 games for the foreseeable future.
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