PlayStation Is Shutting Down the PS Plus App on PC on December 10

If you stream PS Plus games on a PC, you’ve got a month left. PlayStation is retiring the PlayStation Plus app on PC from December 10. It said so at the very end of its November Game Catalog post, under the new games. Hardly anyone used it. Fewer than 0.4% of the Premium members who could, by PlayStation’s count.

What is PlayStation shutting down?

The PlayStation Plus app for Windows. It was the PC side of Premium, the top tier. You signed in, connected a controller and streamed games from PlayStation’s servers. That covered PS4 games from the Game Catalog and a selection of Classics. The games themselves never got installed.

The notice sits at the bottom of the November Game Catalog post. It’s under a heading that only calls it “an update to the PlayStation Plus app on PC.” It’s easy to scroll right past. And if you go looking for PlayStation’s help page on the app, it’s already gone.

Why is PlayStation retiring it?

Almost nobody used it, and that’s the reason PlayStation gives. Fewer than one in 250 Premium members who could stream on a PC were using it. That’s a small group, and you might be in it.

What happens to your PS Plus membership?

Nothing changes on your console. PlayStation says the change “does not affect PlayStation Plus memberships or benefits available on PS5 and PS4 consoles.” Only the PC side goes.

The notice says nothing about refunds or a price change, though. Premium is still $19.99 a month in the US, the same as before. If PC streaming was the only reason you paid for Premium, that’s worth a look before your next renewal. The tiers and prices are on our PS Plus games page.

What happens to your saves?

Start with the good part. A streamed game’s save is “stored on PlayStation,” on its servers, going by PlayStation’s save guide. Your PC never held it. Stream the same game on a PS5 or PS4 and you can carry on with no extra steps.

Want that save in a downloaded copy on your console? That takes one extra step, because streamed and downloaded games don’t share saves on their own. You copy the save to online storage, then download it on the console. On the PC, start the game, open its save menu, press the PS button and look under Application Saved Data Management for Copy to Online Storage. A PS5 or PS4 can do the same while streaming. On the PC, you’ve got until December 10. What happens to streamed saves after that, the notice doesn’t say.

Can you still play PlayStation games on a PC?

Yes, if there’s a PS5 or PS4 under your TV. PS Remote Play puts that console on your PC screen, so anything installed on it can come along, downloaded PS Plus games included, as long as the game supports Remote Play. It won’t carry Premium’s cloud streaming, so stream-only games like the PS3 Classics are out.

What goes away is playing PS Plus games on a PC with no PlayStation at all. From December 10, you need a console, with the game downloaded to it.