Genshin Impact Leaving PS4 Due to Hardware Limitations
Genshin Impact, the popular RPG by miHoYo, is being removed from PS4 in three phases, starting in September 2025 through to April 2026. Gamers who already own it, even if they’ve since removed it from their console, will still be able to download and play it, but won’t receive any further support or updates.
Genshin Impact was released in September 2020 and is available across all major platforms, including PS5 and mobile devices. The developers note that the PS5 version is not affected by this news, and that gamers with the option of moving over the newer console should do so (game progress will not be affected).
“Dear Traveler, thank you for your continued support and love for Genshin Impact on PS4!” miHoYo posted on its HoYoLab site. “Due to limitations related to hardware performance and platform application size, we will be discontinuing support and updates for Genshin Impact on PS4 in future versions.”
“The removal and discontinuation plan for Genshin Impact on PS4 will be carried out in three phases: Game Removal, In-Game Purchases Delisting, and End of Update Support.”
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Mobile Gaming on Modern Consoles
On the surface, this news may sound as if a modern games console has trouble running a mobile gacha game, but this isn’t entirely accurate. For starters, the PlayStation 4 isn’t modern anymore – it was already seven years old when Genshin Impact was released. The console is now almost 12 years old, so it’s not unreasonable that modern games are now surpassing what the device can handle, especially games primarily focused on smartphones.
Genshin Impact has proven very popular on these devices with Statistia reporting that, as of May 2025, the game generated 2.41 million mobile app downloads worldwide, with monthly in-app purchase revenues of $27.7 million. It requires Android 6 and up, and iOS 12 and later.
The game is, understandably, optimized for phones first and foremost. It’s been found to be very CPU intensive on other platforms, including the PS4, and this is also a commonly-cited reason why it never made it to Switch (despite being announced for this in January 2020).
Technical Impact
The regular PS4 has two AMD Jaguar CPUs with 1.6 GHz clock speed, which equals 8 cores, with an 8 thread total. The PS4 Pro has the same CPU set-up except with a 2.13 GHz clock speed. These CPUs were new on the market when the PS4 launched, but were known for lacking performance compared to contemporary Intel processors.
The above details are what help lead to Genshin Impact’s often laggy gameplay on a PS4; compared to the PS5 CPU, which is the equivalent to a Ryzen 7 3800x with up to 3.5 GHz clock speed. The game rarely goes above 30fps on PS4, but easily hits 60fps on PS5.
Players have also noted on the HoYoLab site, and elsewhere, that the game is designed for SSDs, meaning it can run well on phones because these use a version of this (often Universal Flash Storage). By contrast, the PS4 uses a HDD, which is slower and more susceptible to breakage. The PS5 uses an SSD.
Every Journey Has Its Final Day
Genshin Impact will be delisted on PS4 on Sept. 10, with in-game purchases (in both the in-game shop and PlayStation Store) ending on Feb. 25, 2026. PS4 support and updates will cease entirely on April 8, 2026.
However, as of Dec. 17, 2025, all players across every platform will receive binding prompts when logging into the game. This is to make log-in seamless and fast, but won’t actually affect game access on PS4; players will still be able to load and play the game as usual.
MiHoYo hasn’t explicitly stated that it’s removing the game from PS4 completely, only the PlayStation Store, so although by next April the game will be stuck in whatever version it’s on by that point, it should still load and work largely the same as it already does.
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