PS5 Pro doesn't come with a disc drive because Sony says it's "giving players choices," like the choice to spend $80 extra to play the physical games "most players" have

The PS5 Pro, despite being a $700 device intended for the most hardcore of PlayStation players, does not come with a disc drive - instead, it's an $80 add-on. According to Sony, that's because of an altruistic desire to make sure players like you have more options.

The decision not to bundle a disc drive with the Pro is about "giving players choices," as senior principal product manager Toshi Aoki tells IGN. "With the PS5 Pro, we are offering all these new tech innovations, and we added the two terabyte SSD, as well as the Wi-Fi 7," Aoki says. He adds, "For the disc drive, it is an option for players. Not all players have discs, even though most players may...but we have the option for being able to add that for those players. So I think it's more of the balance of the value proposition that we're giving."

There's a lot to unpack here. First, the acknowledgement that "most players may" already have a collection of physical PS5 games. It's likely that many PS5 Pro players will be upgrading from the standard console, and for anybody who already owns games on disc, getting the drive isn't a "choice" - it's a tax.

The notion of "value proposition" gets a lot closer to what seems like the obvious reason for all this: if PS5 Pro came with a disc drive, it'd probably cost even more than its already eye-watering $700 price tag. But given how those disc drives keep going in and out of stock even before PS5 Pro pre-orders go live, it seems like early adopters are already committed to paying the disc tax. If we're all paying upwards of $800 anyway, why do we need to go to the hassle of tracking down and installing an extra accessory?

Here's where to pre-order the PlayStation 30th Anniversary Collection and where to buy the PS5 disc drive.