• Rumoured earlier this year, Xbox is indeed developing its own handheld gaming device.
• It was confirmed during an interview with IGN by Xbox head, Phil Spencer.
• He also noted that he was a big fan of the ASUS ROG Ally, Lenovo Legion Go, and Steam Deck.

The dust is now settling after Microsoft’s bumper Xbox Games Showcase 2024. While there were a number of notable trailers and reveals during the event, one of the biggest “announcements” came afterwards, with the prospect of a standalone Xbox handheld gaming device all but confirmed.

This as Xbox head Phil Spencer sat down with IGN in a live streamed interview where he discussed hardware, and in particular that an Xbox handheld console is in development.

This adds credence to reports in February this year that new iterations of Series X|S were on the way, along with a handheld device.

“We’ve got more to come. There’s some exciting stuff coming out in hardware that we’re going to share this holiday. We’re also invested in the next-generation roadmap. What we’re really focused on there is delivering the largest technical leap you will have ever seen in a hardware generation, which makes it better for players and better for creators and the visions that they’re building,” Microsoft noted at the time, per The Verge.

As for Spencer’s more recent comments, he outlined his love of recently released handheld devices like the ASUS ROG Ally, Lenovo Legion Go, and Steam Deck, adding that Microsoft should have an offering of its own in the space.

“I think we should have a handheld, too,” he said. “The future for us in hardware is pretty awesome. The work that the team is doing around different form factors and different ways to play, I’m incredibly excited about. Today was about the games… but we will have a time to come out and talk more about platform,” he continued.

Also worth noting is that the device currently in development will likely feature on-device gameplay, and in no way replicate the gaming experience being offered by the PlayStation Portal. “I like my ROG Ally, my Lenovo Legion Go, my Steam Deck. I think being able to play games locally is really important,” he emphasised.

If that were the case, it would certainly give Microsoft an advantage over Sony in terms of the breadth of the gaming hardware it makes available, which becomes even more interesting when you factor in Game Pass, but we may be getting a little ahead of ourselves.

At the time of writing, no mention of a release window or any further details have been mentioned. With the company readying to release new flavours of Xbox Series X|S for the 2024 festive season, the prospect of a dedicated handheld arriving at the same time looks a little slim at this stage.

Either way, it looks like Xbox is banking on handhelds as its latest revenue generator from a hardware perspective.

You can watch the snippet of Spencer with IGN discussing an Xbox handheld console, here.

[Image – Photo by Mika Baumeister on Unsplash]