Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo say they won’t pass on tariff refunds to customers

Sony's own admission is now being used against it in court

It started with an admission from Sony back in July, when the company's finance chief revealed that Sony expected roughly $508 million back from Washington, after courts found that tariffs slapped on PlayStation imports throughout 2025 had largely been imposed unlawfully. 

That admission has now come back to bite the company. A group of gamers filed a proposed class action, arguing that if the tariffs were illegal, and Sony is getting its money back, customers who paid the inflated prices deserve a cut too.

Why PlayStation and Xbox prices became a legal issue

When the US introduced sweeping tariffs on imported goods in early 2025, games consoles were among the casualties and both Sony and Microsoft passed the extra cost straight on to shoppers.

Microsoft moved first, raising Xbox prices twice, in May 2025 and again in September of the same year, pointing to "market conditions and the rising cost of development" as its justification. 

Sony followed suit that August, blaming a "challenging economic environment" for the higher PlayStation 5 price tag. 

Everything changed this February, when the US Supreme Court struck down the 2025 tariffs as unlawful. Companies then moved to claim their money back, but they weren't the only ones with a case to make.

A wave of lawsuits followed, with gamers arguing that the $50-plus price increases on PlayStation and Xbox consoles had been driven entirely by tariffs that never should have existed, and that the money was rightfully theirs. 

One suit called on Sony to compensate anyone who'd bought a PlayStation in the US since 1 August 2025. A near-identical claim against Microsoft, filed by gamer Trevor Hastings in July, made much the same argument.

No harm done, Sony's lawyers argue

Sony's response, filed on Monday with a judge in California's Northern District, was to ask for the whole case to be thrown out. 

Its lawyers argued that someone who freely pays the going rate for a product they wanted hasn't suffered any harm the law cares about, no matter how the seller's costs later shook out.

Two weeks before Sony's filing, Microsoft's lawyers argued there was nothing unjust about a customer getting exactly the console they paid for, adding, "regardless of whatever theory he devised months later about Microsoft’s cost structure."

Both cases are set to drag on, with neither company willing to hand the refunds back voluntarily.

Sony leans on the same defence Nintendo used months earlier

Sony has directly challenged the plaintiffs' case this week, with its lawyers arguing there's no real evidence linking tariffs to August 2025's PS5 price rise. They call the claim "speculative and illogical."

Other factors, they say, could just as easily explain it, including inflation, currency shifts, component costs, shipping and competition, though Sony doesn't say which factors actually drove the decision.

That argument builds on the ground Nintendo broke first. Facing a similar lawsuit over alleged tariff double-dipping in late July, Nintendo's lawyers made the case that Sony and Microsoft would later adopt: "Nintendo or one of its retailers set a price for each product, and consumers decided whether that price was worth paying."

Microsoft has mounted a similar defence, arguing that the case against it doesn't draw any clear connection between the price rise and tariffs.

None of these arguments, from Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo, have yet been tested before a judge.