The PS5 SSD is fast but just like the Xbox Series S and X, it is smaller than what most users are used to by now. Without any games installed on the console, users have 667GB of free storage available. Thankfully, users can still make use of an external HDD to store and play games from. However, while you can easily store and launch PS4 games off an external HDD, there’s no way to move and store PlayStation 5 games.
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Here’s How PS5 Console and Game Sharing Works
If you don’t know, the Xbox Series X and S let you store “enhanced games” on an external HDD. However, they will not boot at all from the device. If you want to play these games you have to copy them to the internal SSD. Up to now, we thought it would be the same situation for the PS5. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Eurogamer reports that the only way to install new PS5 games is to free up space by deleting others and that the console only gives you the option to “move” PS4 games to and from the internal SSD.
The same thing happens to PS5 save games. Users can easily access all their PS4 and PS5 saves on the console. However, only the PS4 files can be copied to a USB or HDD for backup purposes. This has surely been done to prevent third-party access to the save files for modding and tweaking purposes.
This lack of copying feature is going to be an issue for users. In short, it means that the PS5 SSD is 667GB and that is all you have to work with at launch. We know Sony has also disabled the expandable PCIe Gen4 expandable storage slot until further notice. Now, you can’t copy your unplayed games to an external HDD in order to free up space for more content. Hopefully, this is a software issue and the company plans on patching the feature soon.
In the meantime, catch up on how to transfer your data from your PS4 to PlayStation 5 here as well as how game sharing works on the console here.
