Joe Hindy/ Android Authority
PlayStation 3 is a powerful console. The industry had just begun to embrace HD gaming and it was a console with some incredible games. Although it can be emulated, there aren’t many emulators available that do this well compared with something like Sega emulators. Luckily, the ones that do exist do a pretty good job, so we’ll talk about the best PlayStation 3 emulators for PC and Mac.
We’d also like to give an honorable mention to PlayStation Now (learn more). You can play PlayStation 1,2,3,4 and 5 games using the streaming service on your PC. It’s not an emulator, but it still lets you play PlayStation games on PC or Mac.
Let’s dispel some myths right away. RetroArch currently does not support the PlayStation 3 Core. If you’re not convinced, check out the list of cores. We don’t recommend any other PlayStation 3 Emulators. Nucleus was last updated in 2011. Short Waves PS3F is too young for us to recommend. ESX has a sketchy reputation and we don’t recommend this game.
The best PlayStation 3 emulators for PC and Mac
- RPCS3
Click here to read more
RPCS3
Joe Hindy/ Android Authority
This is the only emulator that works well with PlayStation 3.
- Pricing: Enjoy Free Shipping
- Platforms: Downloads for PC, Linux and macOS
What we like :
- Most of our games were played without issues.
- Included are the usual emulator features like controller remapping and savestates.
- This software is open-source, free and available.
- It’s in active development.
What we don’t like:
- First-time users of emulators will find the setup process to be a bit difficult.
RPCS3 has been the best PlayStation 3 emulator up to this point. The compatibility is decent, though some titles, such as Red Dead Redemption: Ascension and The Last of Us still cause some problems. In terms of usability, it’s not bad once you get it set up. However, the setup process is pretty in-depth, and we recommend following the emulator’s Quick Start Guide or perhaps a YouTube tutorial. After you finish the setup, however, it works perfectly.
We tested some games and they performed pretty well. We recommend that you also check out the compatibility list on the emulator developers’ website. As of the time of writing, 67% PlayStation 3 games were playable. That percentage continues to increase with each update. All our games came from the list of Playable Games.
Tell us about any good PlayStation 3 emulators we’ve missed in the comments. Click here to see our most recent Android apps and games lists.
