The PS5 system software update rolling out today gives players their first real look at what everyone else is actually playing. Version 26.06-14.00.00 introduces two new widgets in the Welcome Hub that track popularity and momentum by region, alongside a small but useful addition to party chat that flags who is currently speaking.
It is a modest-sounding update on paper, but it fills a gap that has existed on PlayStation consoles since launch. Until now, the only real signal of what was popular came from the PlayStation Store’s top sellers chart, which tends to reward whatever is newest or most heavily marketed rather than what people are actually spending time with.
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What the PS5 system software update actually changes
The headline additions are the “Top 10” and “Trending Now” widgets, both housed in the Welcome Hub where players land after powering on the console. Top 10 shows the ten most popular games in the player’s region over the past seven days, based on regional play activity. It is unclear whether Sony refreshes that list weekly or on a rolling basis, but either way, it is the first time PlayStation has surfaced this kind of ranking directly on the console itself.
Trending Now takes a different angle. Rather than overall popularity, it highlights multiplayer games or modes that are “surging” in a given week. That is designed to catch things a simple sales chart would miss, such as an older title suddenly spiking after a big content drop, or a fresh release building momentum before it cracks the overall top 10.
Party chat also gets a small quality-of-life boost. Inside the “select more” menu of the control centre, players can now switch on “Display Who’s Speaking,” which flashes a username on screen whenever that person talks. Players can choose where on the screen the indicator appears, which is a small thing but genuinely handy in larger group chats where it is not always obvious who is talking.
PS5 Pro owners get an image quality boost too
For PS5 Pro users specifically, the update turns on Enhanced PSSR Image Quality by default. PSSR, Sony’s PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution upscaling tech, has been steadily refined since the Pro’s launch, and enabling the enhanced version out of the box suggests Sony is confident enough in the improvements to make them standard rather than opt-in.
As with virtually every system update PlayStation ships, this one also carries the usual line about “improved system software performance and stability,” which covers general bug fixes and background optimisations that Sony rarely details in full.
| Feature | What it does | Applies to |
|---|---|---|
| Top 10 widget | Shows the most popular games in your region over the past week | All PS5 consoles |
| Trending Now widget | Highlights multiplayer games or modes surging in popularity | All PS5 consoles |
| Display Who’s Speaking | Flashes a username on screen when that person talks in party chat | All PS5 consoles |
| Enhanced PSSR Image Quality | Improved upscaling enabled by default | PS5 Pro only |
Why this matters for discoverability on PlayStation
Console makers have long struggled with helping players find games beyond scrolling an endless list of new releases or checking a sales chart dominated by the same handful of blockbusters. Xbox and Nintendo have experimented with their own curated recommendations and storefront tweaks over the years, but a live, activity-based popularity tracker built into the dashboard is new territory for PlayStation.
Whether it genuinely helps smaller or older titles get noticed remains to be seen. There is a real chance the Top 10 list simply mirrors whatever already tops the PlayStation Store, in which case it offers little beyond confirming what players probably already assumed. Trending Now has more potential to surprise, since it is built around momentum rather than raw sales, meaning a niche multiplayer game riding a content update could suddenly appear next to major live-service titles.
For players who spend time in party chat, the speaking indicator is arguably the more immediately useful change, especially in larger groups where audio alone does not always make it obvious who is talking. Combined with recent additions like console sharing and Sony’s push into a free ad-supported live TV app, this update fits a pattern of Sony treating the PS5 dashboard as an evolving hub rather than a static launcher.
What PS5 owners should do next
The update should already be prompting for download on most consoles, and applying it is no different from any previous PlayStation firmware release. Players unfamiliar with managing content on the console can find general guidance on downloading games on a gaming console, while anyone sharing a PS5 with family or friends might find it worth revisiting the process for setting up console sharing on PS5 now that more social features are landing on the platform.
Sony has not said whether Top 10 and Trending Now will expand further, such as adding genre filters or friend-based recommendations, but the update at least signals that PlayStation sees value in showing players more of what the wider community is doing. Full details of the release, including any additional fixes, are available on the official PS5 system software support page.
