Now You Can Expand Your PS5’s Internal SSD Storage, But Xbox’s Process Is Still Easier

There’s some great news for PS5 owners looking to finally expand their internal SSD storage, but the reality is that it will never be as easy as popping in one of Seagate’s proprietary Xbox expansion cards.

I can remember a time when gamers cried foul about Microsoft’s decision to utilize proprietary SSD memory cards for the Series X and Series S rather than allowing the installation of third party storage. At a rather steep $220, the Seagate NVMe 1 TB expansion card remains the only viable option, but even so, it’s incredibly simple to use. You just pop the card into the back of your system, and that’s it. Plug and play.

If you’d rather not take that particular avenue, you can always hook up an external SSD (or HDD) to either of the newer Xboxes via USB 3.1, but in doing so, you won’t be able to utilize Xbox’s fancy Velocity Architecture. In other words, external drives won’t replicate the speed of the consoles’ internal drives, nor will they take advantage of games optimized for Xbox Series X|S.

External devices are great for storing games and moving them over to internal when needed, though, or playing the myriad of older Xbox One, 360 or OG Xbox titles without a hitch.

PS5 is in a similar boat, in that demanding PS5-exclusive games can only be played directly from internal storage. External storage via USB is reserved for playing PS4 games and storing PS5 games until you want to transfer them over to internal. But until yesterday, there wasn’t even an option to expand the PS5’s internal storage, conveniently so or otherwise.

An updated Sony support page details how chosen beta users can now start installing supported M.2 SSDs inside their PS5 consoles, which is excellent to hear. However, choosing the right M.2 SSD, as well as the process by which you have to install the drive, is rather…messy? Not for seasoned PC gamers, of course, but I’m talking in terms of the average console user

Follow the link above to see the full convoluted details, including how SSDs need to be a certain height to fit, right down to the millimeter. It’s even stated that “SIE cannot guarantee that all M.2 SSD devices meeting the described specifications will work with your console and assumes no responsibility for the selection, performance or use of third-party products.” So you might do a bunch of research, purchase an allegedly ‘approved’ SSD, and it could potentially not work correctly.

It’s safe to say that expanding your PS5 internal storage is nowhere near as simple as plugging in a proprietary Xbox memory card. Plus, the prices of Seagate’s supposedly PS5-approved M.2 SSDs are at least comparable, if not exceeding, that of the Xbox card everyone has long been complaining about.

The FireCuda 530, which was announced alongside all this Sony news, comes in a whole variety of capacities and varieties. As per the PlayStation support page, however, you’ll need one with a heatsink option to keep your PS5 from burning to a crisp. These range from $159.99 (500GB) on the low end to $259.99 (1TB), $539.99 (2TB), and $999.99 (4TB) on the high end.

On one hand, I’m happy for PS5 gamers who are desperate for more downloadable game space. On the other hand, I can’t help but feel disappointed that Sony didn’t think this through a bit more at the outset. Like I mentioned before, experienced tech people won’t have much issue with pulling apart their PS5s and installing the correct M.2 SSD, but I doubt more casual PS5 users will even make an attempt.

It seems that the M.2 SSD option will eventually move out of Sony’s beta program and into the masses, so I guess we’ll see how people fare with not only the restrictions but also the inconvenience of digging into their PS5s.