PlayStation Plus is changing — very soon. On Thursday, an updated version of Sony’s three-tier gaming subscription offering PS Plus arrives in India and Europe, completing a rollout that began a month ago in parts of Asia. (Due to market and operational reasons, Sony considers India to be part of “Europe” and not “Asia”. I know it’s confusing, but all we can do is accept it and move on.) From June 23 PlayStation Plus , as we have known it for more than ten years, will not cease to exist. Instead, it will be a much smaller part of the newer PS Plus — one better designed to compete with its biggest competitor, Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass. One that is now split into PlayStation Plus Essential, PlayStation Plus Extra and PlayStation Plus Deluxe.

If you did the “Wait, wait, what?” or “How to choose?”, then you’ve come to the right place. While one of them is pretty easy to pick up—I’m talking about the PS Plus Essential—the other two have a lot to offer. I don’t just mean specifics, but even in terms of choice paralysis, as you’ll find out later. So how do you choose between PS Plus Extra and PS Plus Deluxe? What PS4 and PS5 games are available with the new PS Plus? Which one lets you play classic PlayStation, PlayStation 2 or PlayStation Portable games? And is PS Plus now better than Xbox Game Pass? We’ll have dedicated articles for some of the answers soon, but we’ll cover the rest here.

PS Plus vs Xbox Game Pass: Who’s the top dog now with game subscriptions?

Here’s everything you need to know about the updated PlayStation Plus.

PlayStation Plus Essential: Benefits and Price in India

This is the easiest one to explain, so let’s dive into it first. PS Plus Essential is, sorry I had to, what you know about PS Plus, albeit under a new name. This includes online multiplayer access, 100GB of cloud storage, additional game discounts, exclusive game content, and two PS4 games and one PS5 game every month. Plus, you get access to the PlayStation Plus Collection, a small library of PS4 hits that’s only available on PS5.

And naturally, PS Plus Essential remains the same price as the old PS Plus. It is Rs.499 per month Rs.1199 quarterly or Rs. 2999 per year. The annual subscription provides 50 percent savings compared to the monthly plan and 37 percent compared to the three-month offer. PlayStation Plus has always been more affordable in India, with the same plans priced at $9.99 (approx. Rs. 780) per month, $24.99 (approx. Rs. 1,950) quarterly, and $24.99 (approx. Rs. 1,950) per month. $59.99 (Rs. 4,680 approx) per year in the US. US prices also do not include tax.

PlayStation Plus Extra: Benefits and Price in India

Welcome to the first new level of the new PS Plus. And further, also known as PS Plus mid-tier. PS Plus Extra is also the first real competition for Xbox Game Pass, as it offers hundreds of PS4 and PS5 games, such as Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Demon’s Souls, God of War, Returnal and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, as part of a catalog of games that will constantly updated. Some games are courtesy of Ubisoft+ Classics and included with PS Plus.

Expect the first PlayStation games to stay forever, just as Halo and Gears have always been part of Xbox Game Pass. Sony says new titles will be added twice a month, at the beginning of the month and then around the middle of the same month. In addition to the catalog of games, PS Plus Extra gives you access to all the benefits that are part of PS Plus Essential.

Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales is available with PS Plus Extra/Deluxe

Photo: Sony/Insomniac Games

How much more will you have to pay for the privilege of this catalog of PS4 and PS5 games? PS Plus Extra costs Rs. 749 per month, Rs.1999 for three months or Rs. 4999 in one year. The annual subscription provides almost 80 percent savings compared to the monthly option and 60 percent compared to the quarterly option.

Like Essential, PS Plus Extra is more affordable in India than in the US, where it costs $14.99 (roughly Rs. 1,170) per month, $39.99 (roughly Rs. 3,120) for three months, and $99.99 (Rs. 7,800 approx.) in one year. Again, US prices do not include tax.

In fact, the price difference is so great that three months of PS Plus Extra in India (Rs. 1,999) is about the same as three months of PS Plus Essential in the US ($24.99).

PlayStation Plus Deluxe: Benefits and Price in India

And this leaves us with the third and upper level, which has a dual identity. First, let’s deal with the advantages. In addition to everything we’ve already listed under Essential and Extra, PS Plus Deluxe gives you access to limited trials – from one to three hours – of some of the newest titles, such as Horizon Forbidden West, Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection. , and Tiny Tina’s Wonderland.

Plus, PS Plus Deluxe gives you access to hundreds of classic games from the OG PlayStation, PS2 and PSP eras. Among them are inFAMOUS 2, Tekken 2, BioShock: The Collection and Borderlands: The Handsome Collection. As you can see, PS Plus Deluxe offers better competition to Xbox Game Pass, which also offers games from the OG Xbox and Xbox 360.

Horizon Forbidden West is part of the PS Plus Deluxe game trials

Photo: Sony/Guerrilla Games

The competition is perhaps even stronger if you’re in a market that has PlayStation Now, Sony’s cloud-based game streaming service. PS Now is bundled with PS Plus Premium, the equivalent of PS Plus Deluxe in territories with cloud streaming support. This allows PS Plus Premium to offer a bunch of games from the PS3 era that otherwise can’t run on today’s PlayStation consoles.

Naturally, these upgrades come at a cost. PS Plus Deluxe costs Rs. 849 per month, Rs.2,299 for three months and Rs. 5,749 annually. The annual subscription provides 77 percent savings compared to the monthly option and 60 percent compared to the quarterly option.

PS Plus Deluxe cannot be directly compared to US prices as it is not available there. In fact, due to the lack of cloud streaming variable, PS Plus Deluxe costs less than PS Plus Premium to justify skipping it. For example, PS Plus Premium costs $17.99 (approx. Rs. 1,400) per month, $49.99 (approx. Rs. 3,900) for three months, and $119.99 (approx. Rs. 9,360) per year. Again, tax is not included.

So the price difference between PS Plus Extra ($14.99 per month) and PS Plus Premium ($17.99 per month) in the US is 20 percent, the difference between PS Plus Extra ($749 per month) and PS Plus Deluxe (Rs 849 per month) in India is just over 13 percent.

Now that we’ve covered all three, or rather four new PS Plus tiers, it’s time to boil it down into an easy-to-read table. Here is a direct price comparison of PS Plus Essential, PS Plus Extra and PS Plus Deluxe in India.

What is the best PlayStation Plus tier for India?

Ah, yes. The question we wanted to answer. Unfortunately, unlike the service it’s trying to compete with, choosing between the three new PS Plus tiers isn’t an easy or simple task. (With Xbox Game Pass, the main question is “Do you play online?”) Although it’s definitely easier in India than in countries where PS Plus Premium is the most expensive tier. Let me explain.

If you only care about online gaming, then I don’t know how you got into this article. Let me put that on a platter for you. Stick with PS Plus Essential, it’s exactly what you had with PS Plus. No new features, no price changes. (For the best price, wait for the traditional Black Friday sales, which offer deep discounts on PS Plus.) Here’s your answer. Have a good year.

On the other hand, if you’re interested in the Game Pass-style features offered by PS Plus Extra and PS Plus Deluxe, this is going to be interesting. The cost difference between Essential and Extra/Deluxe is significant, as you can see from the table below. If you pay quarterly or annually, PS Plus Deluxe costs almost 92 percent more than PS Plus Essential.

At the same time, the difference between PS Plus Extra and PS Plus Deluxe is minimal. On a monthly basis, Deluxe is about 13.3 percent more expensive than Extra. When you upgrade to quarterly or annual plans, you’ll need to pay about 15 percent more. Of course, if you plan to sign up for the long term, you shouldn’t consider the monthly plans, given the savings I mentioned earlier — the annual option will save you 77 to 80 percent over Extra/Deluxe.

For that 15 percent more, PS Plus Deluxe gives you access to limited trial versions of games and a catalog of classic games — PS1, PS2 and PSP — instead of PS Plus Extra. It may not seem like much, but if you are going to pay Rs. 4,999 (PS Plus Extra annually) for a game subscription service, my argument is that you should shell out Rs. 750 extra and just get PS Plus Premium (Rs. 5,749 per year). The difference is too minimal to lose other benefits.

Of course, my guidelines might change if Sony were to, say, offer discounts on PS Plus Extra plans and leave PS Plus Deluxe alone. But for now, PS Plus Deluxe and Extra are too close to each other to recommend the middle tier. In fact, this is an indictment of Sony’s three-tier model itself.

The tiered approach feels like a holdover from Sony’s previous subscription models, where PlayStation Plus and PlayStation Now had nothing to do with each other. The two offerings had their own revenue streams, and it looks like Sony is trying to soften the (financial) blow by bringing them together. Perhaps he prioritized the internal requirements of the business rather than thinking about consumers.