There are many games consoles to choose from. We can help you find the one for you.
Back in the day, it was easy to figure out which console was the best. Often there were just one or two on the market that were really viable to buy, and the decision was made by which games you wanted to play – Mario fans always went Nintendo and Sonic fans went Sega. Done!
But these days picking out the best console from the current lot is hard. Sure, there are still exclusives, but 95% of all games that come out are multi-platform. Add to that mid-generation upgrades and technological advancements that promise 4K HDR with some apps and games but not others, and it can be confusing to figure out which console is worth buying.
The good news for gamers is that there are sites (just like the one you’re on now) to help you narrow down the options. We don’t play favorites and we don’t have a preference for one set of titles over another. We’re just here to play by the numbers and give you all the details on the best and brightest new hardware.
That said, we have a few questions to get the ball rolling: Do you need or want 4K? Is there a franchise you feel particularly close to? Do you want something you can play on the go? What’s your budget?
Gamers who want 4K should consider the Xbox One X, PS4 Pro and Xbox One S, while HD gamers can stick to the PS4 Slim and Nintendo Switch. If you’re a racing or a shooting game fan, Xbox has a lot of first-party titles that cater to that genre while Sony has tons of great action-adventure and RPG titles. Nintendo has a mix of everything, but you should go for Nintendo if you can’t live without an annual Pokemon and Mario title in your life.
To help make things a little less complicated, we’ve compiled this guide to the latest consoles on the market and weighed up their most notable pros and cons. We’ve also provided links to our other hubs of information in case you want to dive even deeper with your research.
[Update: While Xbox and PlayStation are still the online gamers’ paradise thanks to their stable infrastructure and large pool of players, Nintendo is finally ready to enter the great cloud computer in the sky with its Nintendo Switch Online service that’s set to debut in the second-half of September. The online service will allow you to save games to the cloud in case something happens to your local file and offer a rotating selection of downloadable games from the NES era. We’ll update this article again when the service goes live, but for now it’s definitely worth noting that Nintendo is in the running as an online-ready console competitor.]
Dimensions: 11 x 10 x 1.5 inch(W x L x H)| GPU: 1.84 TFLOPS, AMD Radeon™ based graphics engine| RAM: 8 GB of GDDR5| Max Resolution: 1080p| Optical Drive: DVD/Blu-ray| Storage: 500GB or 1TB (expandable)
Available in standard or slim versions, the PS4 is the baseline console offering from Sony.
Since it launched 4 years ago, the PlayStation 4 has been a firm fan favorite, boasting incredible sales figures.
The console’s single biggest strength is its exclusive games – in world of increasingly service-based online titles, PlayStation continues to push narrative-driven single-player titles such as Uncharted, God of War, Horizon Zero Dawn, and The Last of Us.
It’s also the only console at the moment that offers access to virtual reality experiences (though you will have to purchase the PlayStation VR headset separately if you want to take advantage of this capability).
If you’re interested in the new 4K resolution everyone’s talking about, you won’t find that here. While even the budget Xbox One S offers 4K upscaling, the base PS4 is resolutely 1080p. PlayStation also isn’t great when it comes to backwards compatibility so if you’re hoping you’ll be able to play your old PlayStation 3 library with ease, you won’t.
If you’re looking to enter the latest console generation in the most affordable way possible and you like what games PlayStation has to offer then this is the console to go for.
Buy this if you want: the latest generation games but don’t need 4K, you want PlayStation exclusive games, console VR, and a console for under £250/$250.
Key reads: Make sure you check out our full PlayStation 4 review and our picks of the best PS4 games. Think it’s the console for you? These are the best PS4 deals you can get right now.
Dimensions: 12.8 x 11.6 x 2.1 inch (W x L x H)| GPU: 4.20 TFLOPS, AMD Radeon™ based graphics engine| RAM: 8 GB of GDDR5,1 GB DDR3| Max Resolution: 2160p| Optical Drive: DVD/Blu-ray| Storage: 1TB (expandable)
Anything the PlayStation 4 can do, the PlayStation 4 Pro can do slightly better. If you’re invested in the 4K resolution revolution and HDR makes you hot under the collar, this is the Sony console for you.
The PlayStation 4 Pro plays all the same games as the standard PlayStation 4, so if you’re upgrading you won’t have to start your library afresh and you won’t need to pay any more for new 4K games either. You may, however, see an improvement in how they look and perform compared to the standard PS4.
The PlayStation 4 Pro is the most powerful console in the PlayStation lineup at the moment, capable of outputting native and upscaled 4K in games that have been patched to make that possible. Even games that haven’t been specifically patched can make something of this console’s greater power – you’ll find images look a little sharper and games will overall run more smoothly thanks to the PS4 Pro’s Boost Mode.
Like the standard PS4, this console has an excellent library of games and some fantastic exclusives as well as Playstation VR support.
Though it’s capable, it’s not every game that will output native 4K on the PS4 Pro – many of them will be upscaled as the console just doesn’t have quite the degree of power required to maintain native 4K resolution and run a large game with consistent frame rates.
The PS4 Pro also has the same problem as the PS4 in that there isn’t good backwards compatibility for previous console generations. There’s also no built-in Ultra HD Blu-ray player so if you’re looking for a console that will play your physical 4K media, this isn’t the one. It will, however, still play standard Blu-rays and DVDs, and can stream in 4K from compatible services.
If you don’t have a 4K HDR TV and super sharp visuals aren’t something that will drastically improve your enjoyment of a game then this console might not actually be worth the extra cash you’ll splash on it, particularly if you already own a standard PS4 console.
If you are coming into the new console generation for the first time and a 4K HDR TV is something you’re seriously considering purchasing, then the Pro will at the very least future-proof you.
Buy this if you want: Native 4K and HDR gaming, PlayStation exclusives, VR gaming, native 4K for under £350/$400.
Key reads: Check out our full PS4 Pro review as well as our list of the best games for the console. Think you might make the jump to 4K? These are the best PS4 Pro deals at the moment.
Dimensions: 11.6 x 8.9 x 2.5 inch (W x L x H)| GPU: 917 MHz, AMD Radeon™ based graphics engine| RAM: 8 GB of GDDR3| Max Resolution: 1080p (max 2160p for video)| Optical Drive: 4K/HDR Blu-ray| Storage: 500GB, 1TB or 2TB
Looking for an entry level console but not interested in what PlayStation has to offer? Why not look at Microsoft’s Xbox One S. This console has superseded the original Xbox One for many reasons – it has a much smaller and sleeker design, and it’s just that little bit more powerful.
Something this console can do that the standard PS4 console can’t is upscaled 4K. The Xbox One S’s 4K capabilities aren’t at the same level as the PS4 Pro or Xbox One X as the 1080p images are largely just stretched to fit a 4K screen without any clever checkerboarding but this rudimentary upscaling is reasonably impressive in a console with price starting from only £170/$190.
To make up for a lack of good exclusives, Xbox consoles do have much better backwards compatibility capabilities than PlayStation consoles. On Xbox One S you’ll be able to purchase and play original Xbox and Xbox 360 titles, many of which have become key classics.
If you ever owned an older Xbox console and you still have the games from that, or you really want to catch up on a bunch of excellent titles you missed out on then the Xbox One S is a great way to do this.
An area where Xbox completely outstrips PlayStation is overall home entertainment – while both consoles are able to stream from a variety of entertainment apps like Netflix and Amazon, the Xbox also has a 4K Blu-ray player built in.
This is a feature Sony was criticized for not having in the PlayStation 4 Pro, so if you have a large physical Ultra HD Blu-ray collection and it’s important to you that you’re able to play it then the Xbox One S will definitely win your favor here. If you’ve been thinking about picking up an Ultra HD Blu-ray player anyway, then this console is one of the cheapest ways to do so.
One issue Xbox has compared to PlayStation is exclusive games. Where PlayStation has quite a robust collection of exclusives, Xbox is somewhat lacking. Franchises such as Halo, Gears of War and Forza might call this platform home, but their critical reception hasn’t quite hit the heights of Horizon: Zero Dawn and Uncharted.
