My biggest fear of moving to the new PS Plus hasn’t materialized – thanks PlayStation

MeinMMO author Maik Schneider has been using PS Plus since the first days of the subscription service and has experienced many changes in the process. He looked at the recent changeover to the new system with some reservations and feared for his wallet. But the best feature of the PS4 & PS5 subscription remains: “Console Sharing”. He shows you how generous Sony is.

When the first concrete hints about the transition from PS Plus emerged, I wrote on MeinMMO about my fear of losing the best feature of PS Plus – sharing. With this I can supply a second PlayStation with PS Plus and my purchased games without having to pay extra.

When we first discovered that on the PlayStation 3, up to five sharing accounts were possible. We bought all the games on CD, which was considered good manners. But with DLCs, “sharing” was the order of the day – someone bought the content and everyone else could play along.

Over time, the number of accounts suddenly dropped to three. With the switch to PS4, the system changed and the “Primary Console” was introduced. This reduced the number to two.

I kept my fingers crossed until the last moment and I’m really relieved at how generous Sony is in sharing the new PS Plus subscriptions. Because you can really use everything!

More information about the new PS Plus is available in our video:

PS Plus: sharing extra and premium content is no problem

How does sharing work on PS4 and PS5? You can set a “Primary Console” in the account settings on your consoles. This PS4 or PS5 can then use all games with all accounts on this console. On the PS5, the feature is now called “Console Sharing and Offline Play”.

The highlight: You also have access to the games on other consoles with your own account that bought the content – as long as you are logged in with this account.

That also included PS Plus. On the “Primary Console”, all accounts could use online multiplayer, for example. Buy once, benefit twice.

Now how does this work with PS Plus Extra/Premium? Immediately after transferring the long list of over 500 plus games from the PS Store to our game list on MeinMMO, I went to my girlfriend’s PS5 in the living room to test the sharing functions together with my console.

And what can I say: It works great. On the “Primary Console” I activated two games on my account: one from PS Plus Extra for download and one from PS Plus Premium for streaming.

My girlfriend’s account, which is actually PS Plus-free, can use both games – regardless of whether the game is on the disc or comes via the streaming service. It is important that you first activate the games in the account that has PS Plus.

The streaming thing is a little weird. You have to start the game completely on the account with PS Plus. It is not enough to start the game briefly and end it again in the streaming loading screen. Otherwise, a small lock on the game symbol in the menu will signal that something is wrong here.

A strong feature of the PS5 in this context: If I log into my account on the “Primary Console”, I will no longer be kicked out of the account on my own PS5.

It’s different on the PS4. Except for this nice quality-of-life function, sharing on PlayStation 4 also works perfectly – I’ve tested it on both console generations.

So in total I can supply four PlayStation consoles with PS Plus Premium, but only have to pay once – two PS5 and two PS4.

Although there is the restriction that I can’t play against myself in multiplayer with my own account. Only three consoles can be used here because number 4 would be the second PS4 that I would have to log into myself.

If you are now looking for information about the new PS Plus services, you will find all the details here:

• PS Plus subscriptions: costs, games, services

Do all PS Plus features work with sharing? There are a few restrictions. Some features can only be used with the account that actually activated PS Plus.

• Cloud storage for game saves
• share play
• Game guide on PS5

The cloud storage is the most important thing for me personally, but I don’t really think it’s a bad thing that the feature is missing. As long as the games all work properly. I certainly won’t buy CDs anymore.

Please give me your opinion on the subject. You can also ask questions about sharing if you want me to test something else.

If you are still looking for a PS5 yourself, then I recommend our sales ticker: Buy PS5 in the ticker – all news and drops