If you are in the handheld gaming scene you have likely been wondering where Anbernic has been this year. After a strong 2024 releasing as many Retro Handheld Game Consoles as there are months in the year, they have been whisper quiet in 2025.
Good news for Anbernic fans they officially announced the RG557 this morning. This is a handheld that has been rumored since GDC 2025 as it was found unbranded on a vendors table. We have written about it and posted images a couple times on RetroSpecd.gg in March:
- Anbernic’s NEW RG557 running what Snapdragon CPU?
- That was fast: Rumored Anbernic RG557 Images in the Wild!
We don’t have much more than a teaser trailer at this point except some good news on the display. If you like the 5.48” 1920×1080 AMOLED display on the RG556, it looks like the new RG557 will be using the same screen.
We also know at launch it will be coming in 2 colors: a translucent purple and white. I picked up the translucent blue with the RG556 but the RG557 does look damn good in that white too.
Another big win here is Anbernic appearing to stick to the same ergonomics on the RG557. That’s great news because the RG556 is one of the most comfortable Retro Handhelds to play for extended periods of time. The more I look at it the more I believe the only change to the body is the joysticks.
Though the RG556 has HallEffect joysticks they honestly aren’t very good. It was the device that many of us learned there are glaring difference even amongst HallEffect Joysticks. They defiantly aren’t all created equally. The image and video seem to show the RG557 sporting the newer and honestly pretty awesome HallEffect joysticks found on the RG406H/V’s. This would be another welcome update.
It seems like Anbernic might have learned if they have a great device they don’t need to completely reinvent it for a new generation. It’s always been a bit frustrating with Anbernic abandoning designs completely year over year so this is a welcome change and hopefully an indication for what we’ll see going forward.
I would love to see Anbernic put the new Snapdragon G2 Gen2 in this RG557. I feel like if that was the case it would have been announced at GDC however. One can hope though?
I would expect to see a post from Anbernic on their news page like we normally do in the next couple days. You can check the Anbernic News Blog here.
As always I’ll update you once we get more info.
I’m excited about this release, how about you?
GameOn
CellPhish
This article may contain affiliate links. If you use these links to purchase an item I may earn a commission which comes at no additional cost to you and supports future content.
