The Playstation Network is going through an evolution phase, of sorts, with PS Now replaced by a tiered membership system this year, after many rumors and speculation.
With the new tiered system, Playstation fans can purchase subscriptions based on one of the three available tiers— Essential, Extra, and Premium.
Essential is the basic PlayStation Plus everyone is used to, with Extra and Premium costing more and having additional benefits.
With all the new changes to Playstation Plus, is there a way for one player to gift a Playstation Plus tiered membership to another Playstation player?
Can You Gift Playstation Plus?
You can’t gift Playstation Plus, at least not directly. You can, however, purchase a digital Playstation store gift card that will cover the cost of any subscription and give it to a person of your choice. That person can then redeem the gift card against anything for sale on the PlayStation store, including a PS Plus subscription.
However, one thing to avoid is buying a gift card for the wrong region. Voucher codes can only be redeemed in the same PS Store region they were bought in. So if you’re in the US and your broke buddy is in the UK, you’ll need to purchase a UK PlayStation store gift card for them.
Before the introduction of the Essential, Extra, and Premium tiers, Sony used to provide cards specifically for PS Plus subscriptions.
But slowly and quietly, these Playstation Plus gift cards began disappearing off of shelves during the build-up to the revamped PS Plus. The gift cards allowed consumers to purchase a month, three months, or an entire year’s worth of Playstation Plus.
In their place are PS Store gift cards that match the prices of the three PS Plus membership tiers. The difference is that these gift cards must be redeemed first.
Sony also used to allow players to purchase digital games and gift them to other players. However, they’ve since cut that as well. The only thing left that you can gift/share is your own account, with one other person, who has to be on the same console as you, just with a different account.
Related Article: Can You Download PS Plus Games From Previous Months? (Explained!)
Playstation Plus Tiered System
With the new tiered system, Essential, Extra, and Premium, standard Playstation Plus cards are replacing the originals on store shelves. This is the only way you can gift someone a Playstation Plus membership (technically). However, the new gift cards are not labeled with any of the three options.
Now, Playstation gift cards are only for funding your wallet. If you’re the recipient of a Playstation Plus gift card, the money goes into your Playstation wallet fund when you activate the card. From there, it’s entirely up to you how the card is spent.
So even if you are intending to gift someone a Playstation Plus membership, the recipient can spend that funding in whatever way they want. All your friend needs to get started is the activation code on the back of the Playstation Plus card.
While the idea of purchasing a Playstation Plus gift card that only funds your wallet may be a little irritating, that’s the route Sony has chosen for the time being. Since the Playstation tiered system is still fairly new, it’s probable that some refinements are on the way.
Unfortunately, Sony doesn’t have a “suggestion” box, so if you would like to see PlayStation Plus gifting in the future, you will have to contact PlayStation’s Customer Support Service to make your suggestions known.
Bottom Line
Sony is almost as notorious as Apple when it comes to restricting things into a narrow tunnel of allowances.
You can have your cake but you can’t eat it as well. For now, you can’t gift a Playstation Plus subscription—you can only give a gift card. Hopefully, Sony will make some changes in the future but you shouldn’t pin your hopes on it.
