In November 2023, the PlayStation Portal was launched as a $200 peripheral for remote play with the PS5. It has, however, gone beyond the call of duty and is now being hailed as one of Sony's biggest wins in the gaming market. The gadget looks like a DualSense controller and has an 8 inch, 1080p LCD display for streaming PS5 games over Wi Fi. It also has the latest haptic feedback and adaptive trigger technologies, which give users the same kind of controls as on the console but in a portable device.

Moreover, the PlayStation Portal has sold like hotcakes if we are to believe Sony's officials, and it is currently the device that is being used the most for PS5 Remote Play, hence the higher number of users as compared to PCs and mobile applications. The unforeseen success has led to the Sony executives mulling over their 'long held' dreams of a handheld gaming device.

With the 2025 firmware updates, the Portal has become much more attractive and has been extensively changed to be a cloud gaming device instead of a simple streamer without a TV. The current update allows Cloud Streaming to be performed outside the PS Plus Premium catalog, thus enabling subscribers to play many of their digitally owned PS5 games in a way that appears to be streaming from their library if they keep the $160 yearly Premium tier. Along with a reorganized user interface, 3D audio support, and the in game store buying option, the device becomes more of a standalone handheld with which one can have a fluid experience of 60fps over a stable connection of as low as 13Mbps.

They say it is a nice and comfortable way of playing couch co op games or quick gaming sessions away from the TV. In simple terms, the device has been turned into a controller with a big screen which is light and provides a smooth experience for PS5 owners, hence no need to carry the entire console with you.

Nonetheless, the Portal's reliance on Wi Fi and a PS5 (or cloud subscription) emphasizes its main drawback: it is not a standalone device. Local input lag on weak networks, no Bluetooth audio, and the necessity of a home console limit the user's experience to certain scenarios, thus annoying users who seek offline options. Consequently, this has escalated the pleas for a dedicated handheld, akin to the glorious epoch of Sony's PlayStation Portable (PSP), which Sony released in 2004 and sold over 80 million units by way of its groundbreaking UMD discs, multimedia capabilities, and the porting of major franchises like Grand Theft Auto and God of War. The PSP's slide glass design and widescreen features made it a cultural icon, but Sony's transition to the Vita (2011) was a failure due to lack of support and competition from smartphones.

After the massive success of the Portal and the good sales of Nintendo Switch, Sony is keeping a very close eye on the handheld market. This doesn't only mean that the fans' long wish for a PSP revival has been acknowledged, but that it might actually happen. Even in 2025, people remember fondly the PSP's library of more than 1,300 games, and there are still many who have modified their devices for retro gaming. However, modern gamers want to have the option to play very high quality games from the PS5 while they are on the go. The Portal is only a demonstration device, working through the product and the controls while also gathering customer feedback about the need for portable gaming, in the same way, the Wii U GamePad was a silent harbinger of the hybrid concept.

There is a lot of talk about a real follow up: a separate portable gadget called Project Canis or PSP 3 that is able to run PS5 (and maybe PS6) games directly and can be docked for playing on a TV like the Switch. The leaks imply it will have a 3nm AMD APU with RDNA 5 graphics (1.8 2 TFLOPS), be compatible with old games, and target a launch period of 2026 2028 along with PS6, while the cost would be somewhere between $300 500. Sony is reportedly setting the stage for a development very soon to match Nintendo, oppose Microsoft's lab, and use the revelations from the Portal as a guide, says Bloomberg.

The Portal, which melodically ties the old charm of the PSP with the bleeding edge tech, kind of whispers that Sony will be back with a handheld sometime soon. Just imagine such a device which is like the Portal in design but has the local performance of the PSP and the cloud feature to be able to play PS exclusives anytime and anywhere. The fate of Sony in the handheld gaming saga that was left behind is about to be reversed, and the gaming community couldn't be more ready for it.