PlayStation Portal Review

Peripherals are an interesting market in the gaming space these days. A lot can be considered gimmicky, some can have integration issues, and there are a lot of third-party options out there for almost anything you can think of. The PlayStation Portal differs from all of them in as much as it is an extension of the PS5 itself.

Remote play on the PS5 (and PS4, to an extent) was always a mixed bag for me. It required me to break out the laptop, download the Remote Play app and connect to the console. Controller connectivity was spotty at best, and I never felt like there was the level of immersion that I crave from all my games. So, when the PlayStation Portal became available, I jumped at the opportunity to try it out to see just how good a remote player could be.

First things first, the actual physical device. The PlayStation Portal is a beautifully crafted device. It takes the form of a DualSense PS5 controller with a screen in the middle. That screen is an 8” LCD screen that has an impeccable colour display and is very bright and vibrant. It is so bright, in fact, that I actually needed to turn the brightness down when playing games like FC 24 and NHL 24 because the field of play was too bright. Now, mind you, I was playing them at 1 am in my dark bedroom, but even in the brightness of midday, the PlayStation Portal has a gorgeous display, and there is no compromise on colour quality.

As for the controller itself, it has all the same buttons and configuration as a regular DualSense controller, apart from the touchpad in the middle. The haptic controls on the L2 and R2 buttons were just as good as on the DualSense controller, and the vibration felt just as good, both of which were extremely evident when I tried a few races in Gran Turismo 7 to grind out the new license tests from the Spec II update.

“The PlayStation Portal is a beautifully crafted device. It takes the form of a DualSense PS5 controller with a screen in the middle.”

The PlayStation Portal features two small speakers located on the top of the screen, and they provide an adequate level of sound for whatever you are playing. Nothing world-changing, but it gets the job done. There is also a small microphone on the underside of the bottom of the screen, similar to that of the DualSense controller. Also, like the DualSense controller, there is a headphone port right next to the charging port that allows you to connect your wired headset, provided it is connected through an auxiliary connection and not USB.

Using the PlayStation Portal is as simple as connecting it to the same network that your PS5 is on and pressing play. It does not require its own PS Plus membership or any other add-ons. It will play almost any game that is installed on the console, apart from VR titles or anything that requires a peripheral that isn’t a DualSense, DualSense Edge, or DualShock 4 controller.

Gameplay on the PlayStation Portal is generally very good. I didn’t experience much in the way of slowdowns or framerate issues, as the Portal is capable of playing your games at 1080p and up to 60fps. Most of the choppiness I had was due to distance from my Wi-Fi router, so I can’t really fault it for that, as the signal had to pass through multiple concrete walls to reach me in the bedroom. When I played on the couch, if someone was using the TV, there were no issues whatsoever. I had no lag or stuttering of any kind.

“Using the PlayStation Portal is as simple as connecting it to the same network that your PS5 is on and pressing play.”

I do have a small caveat to report on: the location of the charging port. The charging port on the PlayStation Portal is located directly on the back of the 8” screen but on the underside, so the cable has to go up and in. It’s a good design to prevent damage to the charging cable from it bending and such, but actually getting the cable attached is a bit more complicated than it should be. Since the screen is so slim, there isn’t a lot of room to manoeuvre one’s fingers in such a tight space to connect the cable.

As for what the PlayStation Portal can’t do, that’s a very small list, but it encompasses a lot of content. On your PS5, you have a Games tab and a Media tab, and they both house exactly what you think: games for Games and Netflix, Prime Video, Disney+, etc. for Media. You can basically ignore the entire Media tab when using the Portal. It gives you an error message that reads, “Can’t display the screen on the connected console. The screen contains content that can’t be displayed using Remote Play.” This is likely due to re-streaming issues, so it makes sense, but is still something that I felt should be mentioned.

“Overall, the PlayStation portal is a fun device to use around the house if you want to play your games in a room that the PS5 isn’t located in.”

Battery life on the PlayStation Portal is surprisingly good. The first night I had it, I got about 3 hours of battery life, but then I realized that the device was sitting at full brightness. Once I turned that down to about 50%, the battery life pretty much doubled to about 6 hours. This pretty much made it perfect for those impromptu moments when you aren’t able to sit down on the couch and fire up the PS5 proper.

Overall, the PlayStation Portal is a fun device to use around the house if you want to play games in a room in which the PS5 isn’t located. As long as your network connection is good enough to give you a signal in that room, you should have no problem connecting and playing to your heart’s content. Your games can truly go anywhere now, as long as it’s within your home.

<div data-conversation-spotlight></div>