Does The PS4 External Hard Drive Work On PS5?

If you've recently bought a PS5, you may be wondering whether you can use your PS4 external hard drive on your new console.

Modern video games are huge. With new updates taking up over 20GB on top of an existing 100GB game, buying an external hard drive is essential.

With a slew of top-class PS5 games to play combined with the PS4 best-sellers, it should be at the top of your accessory list - along with a great headset.

However, can you use an HDD for both the PS4 and PS5?

Does the PS4 external hard drive work on PS5?

From Day One, the PS5 supported all external hard drives (HDDs) compatible with the PS4. This means that yes, any HDD you used on the PS4 will work on your PS5.

In fact, the HDD support goes further. As most external HDDs are 'Plug and Play', you can simply remove them from your PS4 and connect them to your PS5 - with all the games still downloaded. This means that any PS4 games stored on your HDD will be playable on the PS5 once connected.

A recent PS5 update in April even added the extra benefit of allowing PS5 owners to transfer PS5 games onto the HDD.

While these games are only playable on the SSD, it does allow for faster transfers of games you don't want to delete, but you don't want to take up your valuable storage space.

How do I play PS4 games from external hard drive on PS5?

Given the 'Plug and Play' feature of a modern HDD, connecting your PS4's external hard drive to the PS5 via its USB port at the back of the console will allow you to immediately play the PS4 games stored on the device.

You can also download any owned PS4 games direct to the HDD through the PS5.

The next-gen console also includes a feature to automatically install any PS4 games to the HDD. This ensures the PS5's internal 825 GB SSD can remain available for next-gen games that require the SSD to run.

To enable this feature, simply go to the PS5's settings and select Storage. Here, scroll down to Extended Storage and click on the option 'Install PS4 Games to USB Extended Storage'.

Is it safe to use an external hard drive on PS5?

Yes, it is safe to use an external hard drive on your PS5, so long as you follow a few steps that ensure your data won't be corrupted.

First, just like on the PS4, removing your external HDD while the PS5 is still running could lead to data corruption. This would mean you would likely have to re-format your HDD and re-download any games.

Of course, sometimes things can go wrong and your HDD may break, but this won't affect your PS5 console.

READ MORE: Best PS4 and PS5 external hard drives