Apex Legends on PS5 and Xbox Series X? Respawn job listing hints at next-gen port

Apex Legends
(Image credit: EA)

Apex Legends could be pinging its way onto PS5 and Xbox Series X consoles, after a job listing appearing to hint at next-gen ports for the hit battle royale game.

As spotted by GamesRadar (opens in new tab), Respawn has posted a job listing (opens in new tab) for senior rendering engineers to seemingly work on next-gen ports of the game, writing that "Respawn is looking for Senior Rendering Engineers to push next-gen platforms and the PC to their limits on Apex Legends."

Apex Legends launched to great acclaim last year, with the smooth gunplay and smart mechanics we'd come to expect from Titanfall developer Respawn. But this is the first time we've got an inkling of the battle royale title coming to next-gen consoles.

When could it happen?

While it's not a surprise to hear Respawn is planning to bring its game to PS5 and Xbox Series X, the job specification leads us to believe that work is already somewhat underway, given the dev is recruiting for individuals to help with "shading", "optimizing", and bug-fixing, which feel like end-of-pipeline considerations for any game.

There are few launch games announced so far for both consoles, and getting Apex Legends: PS5 Edition to players before January would be quite a big achievement – while giving console upgraders a quality battle royale experience to take part in. 

It's possible, though, we won't see it until 2021, especially with lockdown measures hindering game development and leading many publishers to delay big game releases, such as The Last of Us 2 and Ghost of Tsushima. For its part, though, Respawn has only delayed season 5 of Apex by a week so far, so maybe this new version of the game will be unaffected. 

First, though, we'd like to see cross-play for this generation. Anything to announce, Respawn?

Henry St Leger

Henry is a freelance technology journalist. Before going freelance, he spent more than three years at TechRadar reporting on TVs, projectors and smart speakers as the website's Home Cinema Editor – and has been interviewed live on both BBC World News and Channel News Asia, discussing the future of transport and 4K resolution televisions respectively. As a graduate of English Literature and persistent theatre enthusiast, he'll usually be found forcing Shakespeare puns into his technology articles, which he thinks is what the Bard would have wanted. Bylines also include Edge, T3, and Little White Lies.