PlayStation: 'Focus is on Growing Profitability and Not on Chasing MAU at All Costs' - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 01 July 2026 / 3,085 Views
Sony Interactive Entertainment President and CEO Hideaki Nishino in a recently translated Q&A was asked how he expects to drive growth more through increasing the number of monthly active users (MAU) or through higher average revenue per user (ARPU).
Nishino said the main focus is growing profitability rather than chasing MAU. PlayStation has a stable number of MAU with a reported 125 million as of the quarter ending March 31, 2026.
"The focus is on growing profitability and not on chasing MAU at all costs," he said. "There are multiple ways to achieve that via recurring revenue such as add-on content revenue, and MAU growth could also be one of them. But we are focusing more on monetizing our user base, which is well reflected in the strong FY2025 financial results."
This is inline with another comment from Nishino saying that PlayStation does not intend to sell any of its hardware at "significant losses."
Sony has increased the price of the PlayStation 5 multiple times with the Digital Edition going from $400 at launch up to $600 now, while the model with a disc drive has gone from $500 to $650. The PS5 Pro has increased from $700 to $900.
Sales for the PS5 have decreased since the price increase with sales down an estimated 53 percent in May 2026, compared to the same month a year ago, according to VGChartz estimates.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can follow the author on Bluesky.
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we will increase everything but the consumers will get less and they love it!
Expect price hikes soon. Also alittle baffling they say they are not chasing MAUs yet the next article is about them on Live Servive games.
So basically they say. We are not going to subsidise PS6. This short term profits vision over strengthening the brand will be PlayStation is downfall. I highly doubt the brand can survive if PS6 doesn't sell well.
No, they are not subsidising the PS5 because the user base is already big enough to forecast ¥600b in net profit for the FY.
They will be much more aggressive with the PS6 to establish its user base. Just like the Switch 2 has not had a price increase anywhere near inline with component cost increases, and Nintendo basically never subsidised hardware before.
I don't think it's strictly about the sales numbers of the next console anymore, especially with the current cost crisis. The base will be there, and the PS5 will be there for a while to come. They have only recently started really shaking off the PS4 by not porting games to it anymore. Console companies are going to be like phone companies, the base will consist of different iterations of the latest models and not everyone has the latest one, but it's okay.
They haven't said that. They said they do not intent to sell hardware at a "significant loss" which implies they absolutely intend to sell it at a loss lol. They also went a step further in saying that they're monitoring the situation to see what makes most sense for PS6, which could mean delaying it all together.
Ultimately this comment is about the PS5 and re-engaging the existing userbase
