PlayStation Portal, the PS5’s handheld accessory, has become a major success for Sony Interactive Entertainment, with nearly half a million sales.
According to Circana Retail Tracking Service (via), PlayStation Portal sales are currently between 420,000 and 630,000 units in the US since launch in November, 2023. The PS5’s handheld accessory has been a major success for Sony, providing an encouraging lift to the game accessories market.
While the PlayStation Portal sales figures indicate that around 3% of PS5 owners have purchased it in the US, it’s worth remembering that Sony Interactive Entertainment has a more modest sales target for the handheld accessory. It is, therefore, seen as a major success for the company.
Earlier, during an interview, PlayStation’s VP of product management Hiromi Wakai had stated that the demand for the PlayStation Portal has continued to exceed the company’s expectations. She didn’t have any numbers to share at the time, however. She had pointed out that, from the beginning, PlayStation Portal was intended to be a product best suited for people with specific needs and those who want to play in a specific way, so the reactions after the announcement were very much within Sony’s expectations.
Wakai also acknowledged that early adopters of the device played a crucial role in promoting potential use cases to skeptics. Within Sony Interactive Entertainment, various scenarios for the Portal’s utility were discussed, such as playing PS5 games while conversing with someone using the TV in the same room, or playing PS5 games in one’s bedroom with the console being located elsewhere in the house. Upon its release, Wakai’s team received positive feedback from early Portal users, particularly those with reliable home internet connections. She had mentioned that some users experienced lag due to unstable home internet, and some of them ended up upgrading their internet as a result.
