Anbernic's RG Vita Is The PS Vita Shape I Still Miss, With A Catch

• Lee Murray
• Mar 23, 2026
• 2 min read
• News

The PS Vita is the handheld I still mourn. A gorgeous OLED slab that Sony loved just long enough to abandon, and I've never quite got over it. So when Anbernic revealed a machine built in the exact shape my hands remember, I felt that familiar tug. Two of them, in fact. The RG Vita, and the pricier RG Vita Pro.

They aren't Vitas, and they aren't blessed by Sony. They're Android and Linux emulation handhelds wearing the Vita silhouette, the wide body and dual flush analogue sticks, that you fill with your own game backups. A tribute, basically.

The specs, and the one that stings

The standard RG Vita runs on a Unisoc T618 chip with 3GB of RAM and a 5.46-inch 720p screen, on Android 12. The Pro steps up to a Rockchip RK3576, 4GB of RAM, a sharper 5.5-inch 1080p screen, and dual-boot Android 14 and Linux. It also does video-out over mini-HDMI and USB-C, so you can play on the telly. Both have Hall-effect sticks that shouldn't drift, and both claim around eight hours from a 5000mAh battery.

Now the bit a Vita fan will feel. Both screens are LCD, not OLED. The original launch Vita's headline feature was that OLED panel, and that's the one corner this tribute quietly cuts. Handsome screens, no doubt. But not that.

The price, honestly

Pricing is dollars-only, because Anbernic sells direct and ships from China. The standard RG Vita is $99.99 as a 72-hour early-bird price, rising to $109.99 after. The Pro is $139.99 early-bird, then $149.99. There's no official UK price, so any pound figure is a rough conversion, and you'll want to factor in import VAT and duty on top. Pre-orders open on the 23rd of March.

Full spec is on the Anbernic page, and Retro Handhelds has a good breakdown.

For less than a boxed Vita game once cost, you can hold the shape you loved again and load it with your own backups. Just don't mistake it for the real thing coming back. I'll admire the silhouette, and keep mourning the OLED.

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