Will the *PlayStation 6* really dare to sell for $949? Sony definitely isn’t cheap this time.

I’d give it a 7. Because while this news sounds outrageous, it’s not baseless. What really jumps out isn’t that the PlayStation 6 is coming, but that its launch price could directly shut a lot of people out. For someone who’s been playing since the PS1 days, I’ve seen console price hikes before, but when it climbs to nearly the cost of a mid-to-high-end PC graphics card, that starts to feel off.

According to an April 10 report, hardware leak source MLID believes the PS6’s manufacturing cost is around $743, a figure that largely matches Kepler_L2’s earlier estimate. Put simply, two sources that players often keep an eye on are more or less aligned on the core cost issue, which makes this more than just some off-the-cuff rumor. MLID’s conclusion is also straightforward: under normal commercial markup, the PS6’s starting price could reach $749, about $100 more than the current PS5 Slim.

That extra $100 looks like a mild increase, but then again, once the starting point is higher, things can easily spiral from there. The report mentions that if tariffs, global trade tensions, and high DRAM prices all stack together and still haven’t eased by the end of 2027, the PS6’s retail price could be pushed up another 30%, ultimately reaching $949 or even higher. What does $949 mean? This is no longer the old PS3 kind of “painfully expensive” — it’s more like walking into the territory of near high-end hardware with what you thought was a console budget.

More importantly, Sony doesn’t seem to be planning to delay it because of price risks. Sources say the PS6 is still scheduled to launch between late 2027 and early 2028, and AMD has already begun validation work, which suggests the hardware specs are basically locked in. Once console development reaches this stage, it’s no longer something that can be stopped just because players shout “too expensive” a couple of times in the comments — the direction has already been firmly set.

Interestingly, the main reason costs are rising isn’t that every component across the board has exploded in price, but that RAM prices have surged sharply. In other words, the PS6 isn’t simply throwing in parts for the sake of it; it’s more like being held hostage by the memory market. The report even mentions that if memory prices fall later on, Sony may not prioritize cutting the price, but instead raise the memory from the current 30GB to 40GB. That line of thinking feels very Sony — just like the old console-generation play of “if we can’t make it cheaper, then let’s just stuff in more specs.” The spec sheet will look better, but your wallet will still bleed all the same.

My advice is simple: if the PS6 really lands at $949 at launch, ordinary players shouldn’t rush to buy it on day one. This isn’t the PS2 era anymore, where you could buy in blind and still win an entire generation. The console market is no longer that kind of environment. There are more options on the PC side, the PS5 still hasn’t been fully squeezed dry in the later part of this generation, and for many people, sticking with their current hardware won’t be much of a loss. Even if you really want one, you should first see whether the launch lineup is strong enough. Otherwise, spending nearly $1,000 just to bring one home as a living-room decoration — isn’t that even more awkward than some of those mid-generation refresh models back in the day?

The most genuine voice in the player community right now isn’t anger, but doubt. People aren’t unable to accept something expensive; they want to know whether this price will truly buy the kind of visibly obvious leap people expect from a next generation. If in the end it’s just higher resolution, steadier frame rates, plus a few new buzzwords you can’t even notice in trailers, then to veteran players it will feel a lot like some of those cross-gen titles from the late PS3 to early PS4 period: definitely better, but nowhere near good enough to make people empty their wallets immediately. What Sony has to sell this time isn’t just a machine, but a sense of a new era that makes people willingly start over. Without that, no matter how you dress up $949, it still sounds like a joke that isn’t very funny.