PlayStation Portal (about $199–249, check the live price) is Sony’s dedicated Remote Play handheld. Chiaki-ng is free software that turns hardware you already own — a phone, Steam Deck, PC or ROG Ally — into a Remote Play screen. Pick Portal for zero-setup simplicity; pick chiaki-ng for flexibility at zero extra cost. Head-to-Head Comparison PlayStation…
Phone-first players: PSPlay is worth its price. Desktop and Steam Deck players: chiaki-ng does the job free. PSPlay — by independent developer Florian Grill, a one-time purchase of about $6 on Google Play (check the store for the live price) — is a polished, closed-source Android client built for phones. Chiaki-ng is a free, open-source…
Casual Windows/Mac users: Sony’s official app is fine. Everyone else should look at chiaki-ng. The official Remote Play client wins on plug-and-play setup — sign in with PSN and go. Chiaki-ng wins everywhere Sony restricts you: Linux and Steam Deck (no official client exists), HDR tuning, third-party controllers, and network controls. Here’s the honest trade-off….
New users should pick chiaki-ng; existing Chiaki users can migrate painlessly. The original Chiaki (v2.2.0) is complete, stable, and officially in maintenance mode — no major updates are planned. Chiaki-ng (v1.10.0) is its actively developed fork with HDR, new renderers, native Steam Deck support, and a far larger controller database. Here’s the honest side-by-side. Chiaki…