PS Plus added 251 games worth up to $8,000 in 2023

While Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass often gets all the attention when it comes to gaming subscription services, Sony’s PS Plus is no slouch, offering PS5 and PS4 players mountains of games based on your subscription tier. In fact, PS Plus Essential, Extra, and Premium have given players a remarkably strong value-for-money proposition in 2023. How do we know? Well, we spent hours pouring over the PlayStation Store and crunching the numbers to work out the total value of all the games added to PS Plus in 2023 across all three tiers.

With Xbox Game Pass adding 150 games worth $5,000 in 2023, it’s hard to deny Xbox has a great offering, so imagine our surprise when PS Plus gave PS5 and PS4 players even more value than Game Pass in 2023 – at least if you are an Extra or Premium subscriber. If you want some of the best PS5 games and best PS4 games, then Sony’s sub is certainly one way to do it, though it’s a little more complicated than you might think.

First things first, let’s quickly recap the three tiers of PS Plus. Essential gives subscribers a small lineup of ‘free’ games each month that they can claim and keep playing for as long as they’re subscribed. Moving up a tier, Extra competes with Game Pass more directly by adding new PS5 games and older titles too to an expansive library of games. Lastly, Premium, the most expensive option, grants access to classic hits from PlayStation’s past, including some fan-favorite PS3 and PS4 games as well. Each tier includes the benefits of the tiers below, meaning Premium subscribers enjoy the full benefits of PS Plus.

With that out of the way, taking into consideration the current retail price of each game added to the collection on the official US PlayStation Store, we’ve discovered that Sony added 251 titles with a total value of $8,030.13 across PS Plus Essential, Extra, and Premium in 2023. This is still a staggering $7,870.14 worth of games when you factor in the $159.99 12-month subscription cost of Premium, and with over 250 games to play, you should be sorted for a lifetime. Furthermore, this comes after Sony has increased the price of its PlayStation Plus 12-month subscription packs globally by around 30% for all tiers. Though this substantial price rise does sting, the value of the games on offer still remains high.

Though we haven’t been able to conduct this experiment across all regional storefronts, below you can find the USD value we calculated converted into your region’s currency, based on current exchange rates:

• US: $8,030.13
• Canada: $10,738.49
• UK: £6,342.64
• EU: €7,355.84
• Australia: $12,019.35
• Japan: ¥1,166,231.84

Again, this is much more complicated than at first glance, given the three tiers inherent to PS Plus, so let’s break it down.

PS Plus Essential in 2023

PS Plus Essential, the cheapest tier, added $1,479.63 worth of games (that’s a positive value of $1,399.64 when you take away the $79.99 yearly fee). Over the course of the year, 37 games were offered up to Essential subscribers, which is roughly three new games per month. Some months were certainly better than others, however.

The year began with Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, Fallout 76, and Axiom Verge 2 – three great games that appeal to a wide range of players. This is crucial as one of the largest concerns over PS Plus Essential’s monthly games is how obscure or old they often are, so at least January added some heavy hitters to compensate for the low monetary value of the January lineup, compared to other months: $99.97.

On that note, November 2023 added just $79.97 worth of games, the lowest entry of all. To add more fuel to the fire though, the three games available were a rather eclectic mix: Aliens: Fireteam Elite is a good yet remarkably unanticipated game, Mafia 2 is an iconic crime action-adventure, though a weak remaster of this 2010 hit did little for many subscribers, and Dragon Ball: The Breakers is rather niche.

While you might have hoped the festive season would make December the best month, adding $119.97 places it in the middle of the pack. That’s not to say, however, that the games weren’t superb, with Sable being a particular highlight. The best month for PS Plus Essential in 2023 was, in fact, June and October, both adding $149.97 worth of games. The former brought with it Jurassic World Evolution 2, NBA 2K23, and Trek to Yomi, while the latter provided perhaps the weirdest collection yet with The Callisto Protocol, Farming Simulator 2022, and (suitably) Weird West.

It’s safe to say that, when it comes to the numbers alone, PS Plus Essential offered very good value for money in 2023. However, only a handful of the selected games were native PS5 games (most being backwards compatible PS4 titles), and even fewer being brand-new games. Furthermore, with such a wide range of genres and IPs added, many games are destined to miss the landing with the general audience. Arguably, however, this diversity is Essential’s greatest strength, allowing players to try something out of their comfort zone at no extra cost.

The value for each monthly drop of games on PS Plus Essential is:

PS Plus Extra in 2023

PS Plus Extra, the middle tier and closest competitor to Xbox Game Pass, added 168 games worth $7,459.59 ($7324.60 when factoring Extra sub cost), including the Essential monthly games that subscribers still get access to. The amount of games added to PS Plus Extra is actually more than the 150 added to Xbox Game Pass in 2023, though it’s arguably a weaker selection of games on the whole. We hope you like PAW Patrol as there were two added to Extra in 2023, as well as My Friend Peppa Pig and other titles aimed more towards a younger audience.

Following an eerily similar cadence as Essential, January 2023 was the second lowest monthly offering, with ten games totalling $355.90. What made the start of the year even more strange, however, was the selection of games. While Back 4 Blood, Devil May Cry 5, Just Cause 4, and Life is Strange are great games in their own right, the PS4 version of WWE 2K22 joined alongside them. Why is this of note? Well, a PS5 version of WWE 2K22 also existed but only the PS4 version was given away to Extra subscribers – sorry PS5 players.

Following that, the weakest month of PS Plus Extra was November, with just nine games to a total of $288.91 added to the service this month. To make matters worse, the small collection was also rather lackluster, with several niche titles and older games that can often be found for cheap on sale anyhow. Indies Superliminal and Teardown certainly carried November.

While February’s 13 games worth $639.87 wasn’t quite enough to put it in first place, it’s arguably the strongest month in terms of games added to Extra in 2023. PS5 versions of Borderlands 3, Horizon Forbidden West, Outriders, Scarlet Nexus, The Forgotten City, and The Quarry were made available on the service, alongside a handful of other great PS4 games, so there was undeniably a lot to sink your teeth into.

June 2023 was also PS Plus Extra’s best month, with a staggering 25 games added that are worth $779.75 in total. There were also some stellar titles to back it up, with Inscryption, Rogue Legacy 2, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge, Forage, Carto, Far Cry 6, and more. As is the theme with PS Plus Extra though, this month also had some very strange additions, including PAW Patrol Mighty Pups, My Friend Peppa Pig, and Hundred Days: Winemaking Simulator.

The value for each monthly drop of games on PS Plus Extra is:

PS Plus Premium in 2023

Those who fork out for the pricey PS Plus Premium subscription were treated to an extra 46 games worth $570.54. When you combine that with the benefits you get from the lower tiers as well, PS Plus Premium subscribers received a grand total of 251 games with that staggering total value we mentioned earlier of $8,030.13.

With Premium aimed at a very specific demographic, that being avid PlayStation fans looking to dive into the classics, this tier certainly isn’t for everyone. The year opened on a weak note, with PS1 titles Hot Shots Golf 2, Star Wars Demolition, and Syphon Filter 3, worth $24.97.

As for the best PS Plus Premium month of 2024, that would be September with four PS4 games worth a total of $82.96. While this tier is largely made up of PSP, PS1, and PS2 games, there are a handful of PS3 and PS4 games that make their way over. Naturally, these cost more than the classics. We hope you like Star Ocean because you’ll have First Departure R, The Last Hope, and Till the End of Time to dig into.

The value for each monthly drop of games on PS Plus Premium is:

Those hungry to explore the rich history of PlayStation will surely find Premium the cherry on top of an already great value package, though we and fans alike are hoping to see some true competition to Xbox Game Pass.

With the potential of Activision Blizzard games to arrive on Game Pass in the near future, the competition is only heightening, though Sony is adamant against dropping its big-ticket releases on day one. But with many of the PS5 exclusives being among the best games of all time, who can blame Sony for being against it? Though it holds PS Plus back from the widespread fervor of Game Pass, the blooming AAA budgets behind Sony’s first-party titles makes it all but necessary. With Sony expressing that PS Plus is continuously “bringing innovation”, there is, nonetheless, room for improvement in the future.