Microsoft announces three new Xbox consoles, available to pre-order soon

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Microsoft has just announced three new special edition Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S consoles, launching later this year. Pre-orders are expected to open soon.

Revealed at the Xbox Game Showcase, the trio of new Xbox variants each come with increased storage capacity and in new colours. Notably these aren’t more advanced “pro” editions of the console – they’re functionally the same machines underneath the new facelift.

The highlight of the bunch is the limited edition 2TB Xbox Series X in galaxy black, a cosmic, star-speckled design resembling the night sky. The spacey, glittery green colourway extends to a matching galaxy black controller and stand. This model is the only one of the three to feature a physical disc drive.

There’s also an all-digital 1TB Xbox Series X in robot white – a colourway previously exclusive to the smaller, cheaper and less powerful Xbox Series S – and an all-digital 1TB Xbox Series S, again in robot white. The 1TB variant of the Xbox Series S was previously only available in black.

All three new Xbox consoles are due to launch in the “holiday season” later this year – that’s usually around November time – with pre-orders and local pricing set to be announced in the coming weeks.

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Microsoft hasn’t yet announced when pre-orders will open for the three new Xbox consoles. Shortly after the consoles were revealed at the Xbox Game Showcase on 9 June, the official Xbox news blog Xbox Wire reported that “pre-orders, market availability, and regional pricing [are] coming soon”.

We expect Microsoft will open pre-orders for the new consoles in the coming weeks. If you’ve got your eye on the sparkly new 2TB Xbox Series X, you might need to move fast. Microsoft says the special edition console will be available in “limited quantities”.

The all-digital, robot white editions of the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S are expected to join the regular Xbox line-up when they launch, so finding stock of either shouldn’t be a problem. Microsoft also revealed that it’s discontinuing the carbon black 1TB Xbox Series S in favour of the newly revealed robot white edition, so if you really want an Xbox Series S in black you’ve limited time to grab one before supplies run out.

Microsoft hasn’t yet announced UK pricing for the three new Xbox models, but the euro and dollar pricing should give us an idea of what to expect.

Though we’ve seen it drop to as little as £359.99 in previous sales, the Xbox hasn’t seen a major discount in a while. The best price we’ve spotted on the Xbox Series X right now is at Amazon, where you’ll get £35 off Microsoft’s best-selling console.

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The Xbox series X is the most powerful gaming console Microsoft makes. Large and cuboid but completely silent, it matches the performance of a high-end gaming PC – loading games in a snap and booting up menus in a fraction of a second.

In our recently updated Xbox Series X review, our tester concluded that “if you’re invested in your back catalogue of Xbox games and want to see them at their absolute finest, the Xbox Series X is the best way to play”.

While there aren’t as many exclusives as there are on the PS5, the Xbox’s library of games has grown significantly since it was first released in 2020. Xbox Game Pass is the console’s killer feature – a Netflix-style subscription service that gives you access to hundreds of games on demand for a monthly fee. It’s worth every penny.

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