How to clean a PlayStation 5

No product will stay in pristine condition after you take it out of its box.

The PlayStation 5 may retain its performance over time, but it could start throttling and overheating due to an immense amount of dust, preventing it from maintaining a decent airflow. This doesn’t happen overnight, of course, but if you neglect your PS5 long enough in a dusty room, it’ll start acting up.

Cleaning a PlayStation has become a lot easier since the introduction of the removable lid with the PS4. Removing the top layer allows users to clean the fans without taking off any of the warranty stickers. 

Sony includes a few quick tips in user manuals on how you can clean your PS5, and the company even improved the design to make it easier for users to get rid of any dust build up in their systems.

Here’s how you can clean your PS5 to take it back to its glory days.

How can you clean a PS5?

It doesn’t matter if you have the digital or the standard version of PS5, you’ll need a can of compressed air, an adjustable vacuum, and a microfiber cloth.

• Once you have everything you need ready to go, lay down your console sideways and unplug your console. Doing so will allow you to have a better grip on the console.
• You’ll need to lift the back corner of the white plates and gently slide them off sideways.
  • If you’re having any troubles during this process, you can check out the official teardown video of PS5 to get an idea of how it’s done.

• After removing the plates, you’ll have access to the fan and two triangle-shaped dust holes.

• You can vacuum out the dust collected in the dust catcher through these holes, but make sure you aren’t applying too much pressure with your vacuum. Start off with lower wattages and slowly increase to find the perfect vacuuming force that collects most of the dust.

• Vacuuming the fans won’t yield that much of a result since the fan itself is covered by a protective layer. You can clean it with compressed air, though. You’ll want to make sure that it doesn’t move by holding it with either your fingers or anything that can reach inside.
  • If you decide to use anything similar to a tweezer to hold your fan in place, be extra careful not to drop it inside.
• Once you have the fan secured, simply start using your compressed air on the fan. For a better result, you can ask a friend or anyone around your household to vacuum the dust that will come out of the fan as soon as it leaves your console. This’ll ensure that you won’t leave a dusty table or floor behind.

This is pretty much all the cleaning you can do without voiding your warranty since disassembling your console even further will require you to remove warranty stickers. If this simple clean-up doesn’t fix your heating problems, you may need to take your console to a professional or send it to warranty if you still have it.

Advanced users who are already out of their warranty period or would like to clean their systems regardless of any consequences can follow this teardown guide. 

While removing the warranty stickers will cause users to void warranties around some parts of the world, Sony is slowly ending this practice. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) called out the manufacturer in 2018 and caused Sony to accept warranty claims even for consoles with removed stickers.

Note that this will heavily depend on where you live and the sub details of your country’s right to repair laws. Even if you think you live in a country where you have the law on your side when it comes to removing the warranty stickers, we still recommend reaching out to your local Sony customer service or your place of purchase to double-check.

If removing the stickers cause you to void the warranty where you live, you’ll need to take it to Sony to fix any internal problems of your PS5.