Next-gen Xbox to have 2 SKUs including handheld. Believed to be releasing 2026.

[John Elden Ring]

Ryan: "It's been rumored, it's been talked about. We talked about it on the preshow, there was a big reaction from the audience here and that is an Xbox handheld?"

Spencer: "I think we should have a handheld"

Spencer: "The future for us in hardware in pretty awesome and the work that the team is doing around different form factors, different ways to play....I'm incredibly excited about it. Today was about the games. We showed some of our gen 9 consoles, Series S, Series X, the work that we are doing, but we will have a time to come out talk more about platform. We can't wait to bring it to you guys"

Ryan asked if a "hypothetical" Xbox handheld would be something like a Steam Deck or cloud based.

"I think being able to play games locally is really important"

 

[Gediminas]

yet again, non answer. like always, bullshit. guy can't answer straight.

we still waiting for that Xbox VR

 

[PlacidusaX]

Handheld done right they should do.

 

[ethomaz]

People create a narrative that a Xbox handheld is in the work...
But nobody knows if true or false.

Every new show it will be said that it will be revealed

 

[Danja]

I have no doubt they are probably working on one but he's obviously not gonna say so now. I'm sure they have taken notice of the Portals success and I'm sure Sony is also slapping themselves they didn't make a proper one instead of that money pit PSVR2

 

[Kokoloko]

I think they should do it. And let other companies make Xbox handhelds for them

 

[ethomaz]

I have no doubt they are probably working on one but he's obviously not gonna say so now. I'm sure they have taken notice of the Portals success and I'm sure Sony is also slapping themselves they didn't make a proper one instead of that money pit PSVR2

I guess what they are working is a bit different…

Probably they want a Xbox Portable seal to 3rd-party manufactures follow a minimum of requirements to got that seal.

So MS won’t release a Xbox portable themselves but all 3rd-party manufacturers that follow their guidelines for the seal with their custom Xbox portable OS.

 

[Danja]

I guess what they are working is a bit different…

Probably they want a Xbox Portable seal to 3rd-party manufactures follow a minimum of requirements to got that seal.

So MS won’t release a Xbox portable themselves but all 3rd-party manufacturers that follow their guidelines for the seal with their custom Xbox portable OS.

I definitely see them releasing one themselves but I can also see them licensing out the brand. There was that rumor of them and Samsung getting into a partnership for this.

 

[Nhomnhom]

What sort of fool would even contemplate getting a new Xbox hardware?

 

[xollowsob]

Xbox fans: "we want a handheld"
Phil: " we heard you and today we announce a controller that you can link to a TV or mobile and stream your gamepass games to it, using Xplay and the power of the cloud"

Microsoft are the ultimate monkeys paw

 

[Bryank75]

Sony better make the PSP2, that's all I will say.

 

[RE4-City]

Sony better make the PSP2, that's all I will say.

Call it PSP 3
Just rename the vita to PSP 2 like how the original PlayStation was renamed PS One when the PS2 was announced.
Imagine people going to store shelfs and seeing PSP 3 vs Switch 2 (Or Switch U?)
It will make up for the 3DS most likely causes Sony to not name the Vita PSP 2 in the first place!

 

[Zzero]

yet again, non answer. like always, bullshit. guy can't answer straight.

we still waiting for that Xbox VR

I mean, a random interview like this isn't the place to give answers. If he did use that question to announce something then he'd be making an unforced error.

 

[Gediminas]

I mean, a random interview like this isn't the place to give answers. If he did use that question to announce something then he'd be making an unforced error.

it isn't some random interview, they just had a show. don't want to answer, then don't give an interview. what is a point of interview otherwise? just to push his own narrative? then you are open for criticism.

 

[Zzero]

it isn't some random interview, they just had a show. don't want to answer, then don't give an interview. what is a point of interview otherwise? just to push his own narrative? then you are open for criticism.

From a corporate perspective, yes, the point of a post-show interview is to keep selling the things that were shown in the show.

 

[PlacidusaX]

People create a narrative that a Xbox handheld is in the work...
But nobody knows if true or false.

Every new show it will be said that it will be revealed

Happens all the time.

 

[ToTTenTranz]

There's no mobile SoC in AMD's known roadmaps, leaks, etc. that could point to it being a portable Series S which is the only plausible way they'd get a portable console out there in the short term.


The Van Gogh in Steam Deck was first spotted leaks in 2019 and appeared in roadmaps in 2020. It was supposed to go on a 2021 Microsoft handheld from Panos Panay's Surface team (it's actually the first AMD chip with an NPU) until they pulled the rug on AMD at the last minute.



So odds are there is no semicustom mobile SoC being developed for a portable Xbox, and there's no SoC in AMD's short/mid-term roadmap that matches the Series S' memory bandwidth of 224GB/s.
We'll need 14Gbps LPDDR6 to be able to reach the Series S' 224GB/s on a 128bit bus and that's assuming LPDDR6 has equal or lower latencies than GDDR6.
AMD could develop a semicustom SoC with a 4 TFLOPs GPU and 256bit LPDDR5, but at this point it would take so much time to bring the chip to volume production that they might as well just wait until they launch their first LPDDR6 PC SoC which will undoudbtedly surpass the Series S anyways.


TL;DR: don't count on a portable Series S anytime soon.

Microsoft could just take one of AMD's latest APUs like Strix Point or Kraken and set a new performance target for those on the Xbox SDK. But that would require readjusting IQ settings and compiling the game again, and to get support parity of already released games with the Series consoles would be an absolute nightmare.
Even among Xbox's 1st party games there's some titles whose developers were all fired and scattered to the winds, like Tango's HiFi Rush.




TL;DR2: Stop trusting Phil's lies. He's full of shit. At best, we're looking at a Windows 11 UI for PC gaming handhelds like the ROG Ally, which then plays Windows PC games. And that's not coming in a cheap package.