An Xbox-ish Handheld Is Reportedly Coming Later This Year

Microsoft could also be pivoting to a multiplatform approach for its largest video games, however that doesn’t imply it’s abandoning {hardware} simply but. The corporate reportedly has an Xbox companion handheld deliberate for 2025 as it really works on its next-gen consoles aiming for launch in 2027. It appears to be like just like the Swap 2 received’t be the one handheld console hybrid gamers have to select from this yr.

That’s in response to a new report by Windows Central. It claims the brand new machine might be an Xbox-branded PC gaming handheld from an present OEM and that it’s codenamed “Keenan.” It’ll have an official Xbox information button and is at the moment deliberate to launch later this yr, with the successor to the Xbox Sequence X/S era of consoles greenlit for a deliberate launch as early as 2027. Notably, it sounds prefer it’ll be a single next-gen console, with the present Sequence S doubtlessly subsumed by the hand held if it’s profitable.

The report additionally claims that the following era of controllers would possibly function “direct-to-cloud connectivity.” It’s believed the Microsoft’s work with generative AI and the prevailing Home windows platform for PC will each play a better function in Xbox’s future as effectively. This dovetails with current alerts from the corporate’s high management.

Final yr, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer mentioned the corporate was exploring a gaming handheld however that a finished product was still a couple of years out. It’s attainable that’s nonetheless the case, and that this 2025 “Xbox-branded” handheld is taken into account extra of a half-step in that path. Earlier this yr at CES 2025, Jason Ronald, Microsoft’s VP of “Subsequent Technology,” told The Verge the corporate was the aiming to convey the “better of Xbox and Home windows collectively” for future PC gaming handhelds, seemingly by means of a brand new gaming-centric OS or OS layer that would compete extra straight with SteamOS.

Replace; 3/10/25 5:30 p.m. ET: As clarified in an exchange between The Verge’s Tom Warren and Windows Central’s Jez Corden, Keenan will be something of a reskinned “partner” PC Gaming handheld running this new software layer, not a full-blown Xbox device developed in-house.

These moves come as rumors swirl about Sony working on bringing again its personal line of gaming handhelds and with Nintendo’s Swap 2 simply on the horizon. This time round, nonetheless, it doesn’t seem to be Microsoft plans to combat the competitors with exclusives. The corporate began bringing its video games to PlayStation 5 and the prevailing Swap final yr, and its extra highly effective specs counsel we’ll see much more Xbox video games on Swap 2. Microsoft additionally beforehand dedicated to start out bringing Name of Obligation again to Nintendo’s platform in a single kind or one other.

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