Microsoft's Next Xbox Could Cost as Much as $1,800 and Is Targeting a 2028 Release, per IGN
The next console generation could cost like a gaming PC
Microsoft's next-generation Xbox console, codenamed Project Helix, could cost as much as $1,800 when it launches in 2028, with a new handheld reportedly arriving a year earlier, per IGN. The figure comes from a Fortune profile of Xbox CEO Asha Sharma, which reported that the Helix console "has internally been projected to cost consumers between $1,200 and $1,800, unless Microsoft decides to subsidize the cost."
The timeline in the report is a family of devices rather than a single box. Sharma reportedly plans to release a next-generation handheld by the 2027 holiday season, followed by the Helix console itself by the holidays in 2028, and people familiar with the matter told Fortune that engineering deadlines for Helix have been moved up by at least several months. Microsoft has officially confirmed only the narrower version: Helix is a first-party console designed to play both Xbox console and PC games on a custom AMD chip, with alpha developer kits set to ship starting in 2027.
Memory prices are doing this
The driver is component costs. The AI boom has sent memory prices surging, pushing up the cost of consumer electronics across the board, and the next console generation is exposed on both sides of the Pacific: it was claimed last week that Sony's PlayStation 6 storage and memory components alone will cost more than $680 per console. Microsoft has absorbed hardware losses before, admitting in 2021 that it had sold Xbox consoles at a loss for years, but subsidizing a console projected at up to $1,800 is a different order of decision.
The Fortune profile also described a fight over what Helix will run: Windows leaders wanted the handheld to use a trimmed-down version of Windows Home, while Sharma's team pushed to build and control its own software, a clash in which a senior Xbox executive reportedly threatened to scrap the handheld rather than adopt the Windows build. The same report said Xbox is planning a major overhaul of Game Pass that would let players choose features à la carte, with add-ons for console-only games, cloud gaming and multiplayer inside a tiered structure, and that Sharma has cut 1,868 jobs so far as part of plans to reduce headcount by 3,200 over the next year.
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MSFT is the direct name: a subsidized $1,800 console is a margin story for the Xbox division, while an unsubsidized one is an install-base story, and either outcome feeds straight into Game Pass, which remains the center of Microsoft's gaming strategy. The reported Game Pass overhaul, with à la carte tiers, is the lever that would have to make the hardware math work.
The supply chain is the second read. Helix runs on a custom AMD chip, and the same memory inflation squeezing console makers is a demand tailwind for component suppliers. Across the aisle, SONY faces the same cost wall with the PlayStation 6, so pricing signals from either company reset expectations for both. Watch for any Microsoft comment on the Fortune reporting, official Helix pricing or subsidy language, and memory contract pricing into 2027, and follow gaming coverage on the Unusual Whales news feed.
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