PS5 preinstalled entertainment apps finally revealed as Sony shares latest update

In less than a month, people who preordered the PS5 will finally receive their consoles on Nov. 12. The staggered release dates mean buyers in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, Mexico, Japan, Canada, and South Korea get to play first. Meanwhile, the rest of the world will follow on Nov. 17. By now, the gaming community should be familiar with what the next-generation console brings to the table. However, little has been revealed about its entertainment functionalities until now.

So far, Sony has provided a glimpse of the new user interface albeit in prerelease form. Prior to that, the company also uploaded an official teardown video of the PS5, which was performed by the brand's VP of Mechanical Design, Yasuhiro Ootori. Now, it has confirmed the apps and streaming services that will be preinstalled on each unit will ship out next month. Although owners will primarily use the system for gameplay, some turn it into an all-in-one entertainment platform.

According to Sony, "movies, TV shows, music, and gaming live streams only add to the PlayStation experience." All PlayStation console generations featured multimedia capabilities, such as music CD, DVD, and Blu-ray disc playback. Starting with the PS3, streaming apps were introduced which was expanded and carried over to the PS4. Now, the PS5 continues the legacy with apps such as Netflix, Spotify, Disney+, Twitch, YouTube, and Apple TV+.

Moreover, much like the PS4, Spotify can continue playing in the background even while the users play their games. As for Apple TV+, the developers confirm it will likewise be made available for the current-generation console. Sony's software engineers recently confirmed that tweaks have been done to make it easy for PS5 users to switch between gaming and entertainment. Thanks to the read/write speeds offered by its custom SSD, transitioning between apps should deliver a seamless experience.

PS5 preinstalled streaming apps finally confirmed

Although some content streaming apps are currently unavailable, Sony has plans to add those in the future. So far, those identified include Peacock, Hulu, MyCanal, and Amazon Prime Video, but a specific timeframe was not provided as of this writing. Finally, a close-up view of the media remote shows that the bottom four shortcut buttons – which were originally blank – now have logos of the apps assigned. These are Netflix, YouTube, Spotify, and Disney+ with the PlayStation logo just below.