19% of PS Plus subscribers are still playing on PS4, Sony says

Sony's PlayStation 4 is still quite active in the gaming ecosystem, and comprises a respectable slice of business revenues as well as PlayStation Plus subscriptions.

3

PlayStation Plus just celebrated its 15th birthday, and Sony says that the service is still going strong into the fifth year of the PS5 generation. PS Plus has served as a kind of intermediary bridge between the PS4 and PS5 generations, but Sony may not have expected this bridge to last so long, nor for so many people to keep sticking with the PS4.

In a new interview with Game File's Stephen Totilo, Sony VP of global services Nick Maguire divulged an interesting stat: some 81% of PS Plus subscribers are on PS5, which means the remaining 19% are still on PS4.

3

Other metrics about the gen 8 console are likewise surprising. About 30-40% of total PlayStation Network monthly active users are still on PS4, and assuming a count of 124 million MAU, between 37.2 and 49.6 million people are playing on the last-gen PlayStation 4.

Sony has decided to embrace this cross-platform business model by not retiring the PS4 any time soon.

At a recent annual corporate business meeting, Sony management affirmed that PS4 users are still "active and spending," and that the last-gen console is still a big part of the PlayStation business.

"We've reduced traditional cyclicality by establishing a large ecosystem of players across both the PS5 and PS4 generations, which provides recurring revenues.

"This has driven an overall high and stable level of spend on content and services, which by the way now constitutes 2/3rds of our revenue, providing a consistent, predictable, and profitable base of our revenue.

"As we continue to drive multi-generational ecosystem into the future, we'll provide new ways for players to access the platform and experience our content and services."

There's no official word on how long the PlayStation 4 will be supported, but as long as consumers are still spending, Sony will keep these consoles online.