Trusted Reviews is supported by its audience. If you purchase through links on our site, we may earn a commission. Learn more.

Cloud gaming is now available on Xbox consoles via Game Pass

Microsoft has confirmed Xbox Cloud Gaming is now available on the Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S and Xbox One consoles, enabling Game Pass Ultimate subscribers to play select games without a download.

Xbox Cloud gaming previously rolled out to smartphones and web browsers, allowing those subscribed to Game Pass Ultimate to access AAA games despite your hardware’s limited GPU power.

Microsoft is now rolling enabling support for consoles, and while the Xbox hardware is obviously already capable of playing AAA games, you instead get the benefit of playing games without the need to install it first, saving precious storage space.

Of course, by using the Xbox Cloud service, performance will be dependent on an fast internet connection. The performance will also be limited to a 1080p resolution up to 60fps. This means supported titles will see better visuals when running natively on a Series S or Series X, so there is still an incentive to download the game onto your hard drive instead.

Still, the idea of being able to start playing a game straight away to see if it’s worthy of a download is very appealing. Microsoft has also revealed this will allow the Xbox One to run games that were previously exclusive to next-gen platforms, such as Recompile, The Medium, and The Riftbreaker.

Of course, not every Game Pass game will support cloud gaming, so it’s worth looking out for the Cloud Gaming icon on Game Pass to see which titles are compatible.

Cloud Gaming on Xbox consoles will be available in 25 regions from today, including the UK and USA, with a Brazil launch ‘coming soon’.

This announcement follows a week of big reveals for Xbox, as the company also launched Halo Infinite multiplayer three weeks early while also adding an additional 76 classic games to the Game Pass library.

Why trust our journalism?

Founded in 2003, Trusted Reviews exists to give our readers thorough, unbiased and independent advice on what to buy.

Today, we have millions of users a month from around the world, and assess more than 1,000 products a year.

author icon

Editorial independence

Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.

author icon

Professional conduct

We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.

Trusted Reviews Logo

Sign up to our newsletter

Get the best of Trusted Reviews delivered right to your inbox.

This is a test error message with some extra words