New leaks hint at PlayStation 6 handheld's capabilities, could be faster than Xbox Series S

The next generation of PlayStation consoles is said to include a standard PlayStation 6 and a handheld version. While Sony has not shared any information on either, leaks and rumors have been surfacing, hinting at what could be expected from the handheld version. It was recently reported that the PlayStation 6 handheld will be powered by a 15W SoC designed on 3nm architecture. Now, new leaks from the same source suggest the number of Compute Units (CUs) are much lower than the current gen PS5, but it can still outperform the Xbox Series S.

The discussion over at NeoGAF forums in the “Do you agree with Chatgpt that PS6 portable can match the power of PS5 in all parameters by 2028?” thread involves a known AMD leaker who goes by Kepler L2. Last month, they shared that the PS6 handheld will be powered by a 15W 3nm SoC. Now, more information has been shared by the same leaker and they claim that the console will have much less than 40 CUs.

While this doesn’t clarify what the exact number of CUs will be, it does suggest that the count is lower than PlayStation 5’s 36 CUs. The leaker goes on to state that the performance of the PS6 handheld should be somewhere between the Xbox Series S and the PS5. The Series S features 20 CUs so the PS6 handheld could feature more than 20, at least.

The SoC inside the alleged PS6 handheld is also said to run at very low voltages and since there is no information on the GPU, estimating the performance is difficult. Previous leaks have emphasized that the handheld will be able to run PS5 games natively but considering the alleged capabilities, it will be at a much lower resolution and reduced visual fidelity.

For now, there is no release date for either the PS6 or the PS6 handheld. The leaker claims that the SoC for the PS6 handheld will “tapeout,” which is the final stage of the design process for integrated circuits before manufacturing, a few months after the regular PS6’s SoC.