YouTuber Austin Evans shows unboxing of the DualSense, the PS5 controller

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A few weeks before the PlayStation 5 launch, the DualSense began appearing outside official presentations. In October 2020, American YouTuber Austin Evans published a video opening the box of Sony’s new controller and showing the accessory up close.

The DualSense had been revealed on April 7, 2020 and, although it started from the DualShock 4, it changed quite a lot. What stands out right away is the look: a mostly white body with a black front, and colorless action buttons, for the first time on a standard PlayStation controller. It is bigger, rounder and heavier than its predecessor, at 280 grams. The light bar moved from the top and now wraps around the touchpad, and the Share button gave way to Create.

Inside, the two big novelties were haptic feedback, made by actuators in the grips, and adaptive triggers, which use motors to create resistance. Sony’s own example was feeling the tension of a bowstring when pulling the trigger. The controller also had a USB-C port instead of micro-USB, a 3.5 mm headphone jack, a speaker, two built-in microphones and a 1,560 mAh battery.

A nice detail that only shows up very close: the underside of the controller is covered by a microtexture of about 40 thousand tiny PlayStation symbols, triangle, circle, cross and square, stacked on top of each other. According to Sony’s design team, the texture was tested many times until it felt firm in the hand without hurting during long sessions. You can see the care in every millimeter.

What came next

The PS5 reached stores on November 12, 2020 in markets such as the United States and Japan, and on November 19 in the rest of the world, with the DualSense in the box. In January 2023, Sony launched the DualSense Edge, a version with swappable parts, back buttons and custom profiles.