PS5 usable storage confirmed – and it's much less than 825GB

PS5
(Image credit: Future)

Our in-depth PS5 review is live, and one of the most important nuggets of information it provides is exactly how much of the 825GB SSD is actually available for you to stuff full of games.

The thing is, the answer isn't exactly ideal for gamers who like to have a wide variety of titles at their fingertips.

The usable storage on the PlayStation 5 is 667.2GB - with over 100GB taken up by the the operating system. That means around 79% of the SSD's space is available for you to use.

As we note in our review, we were able to get "16 games: two PS5 titles, which were Astro's Playroom and Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales, and various PS4 games like God of War and Detroit: Beyond Human" installed onto our PlayStation 5.

However, with current PS5 games coming in at around 50GB and above, and future games - especially the blockbuster titles - likely to increase the average file size, the number of games you'll be able to have installed at any one time on your PS5 may well decrease over the next months and years.

Expandable memory

The good news is, if you're willing to spend more money, you can expand the storage on the PS5, giving you more room for future next-gen games as they launch.

In fact, the PS5's storage can be expanded in three different ways: by installing a Sony-certified NVMe SSD, an external HDD or an external SSD attached via USB. You'll only be able to play PS5 titles off the PS5's internal drive or NVMe SSD, though.

Using one of these options will greatly increase the capacity of your PS5, but we're still waiting for Sony to confirm exactly which brands and capacities will be supported by the console. In fact, the SSD bay won't work until Sony unlocks it via a future firmware update, so don't run out to buy a new drive just yet.

John McCann
Global Managing Editor

John joined TechRadar over a decade ago as Staff Writer for Phones, and over the years has built up a vast knowledge of the tech industry. He's interviewed CEOs from some of the world's biggest tech firms, visited their HQs and has appeared on live TV and radio, including Sky News, BBC News, BBC World News, Al Jazeera, LBC and BBC Radio 4. Originally specializing in phones, tablets and wearables, John is now TechRadar's resident automotive expert, reviewing the latest and greatest EVs and PHEVs on the market. John also looks after the day-to-day running of the site.