Sea of Thieves' PS5 beta is this weekend—here's how to join

Microsoft’s live service pirate game Sea of Thieves will make the jump to PlayStation 5 very soon, and newcomers can get a taste for it even earlier by participating in a closed beta test.

The test is scheduled to run this weekend, starting from 2am PT / 5am ET / 10am BST on Friday, April 12, and ending at the same time on Monday, April 15. That’s plenty of time to get accustomed to Sea of Thieves‘ gameplay loop and mechanics. The downside is this isn’t a ‘try before you buy’ situation. According to developer Rare, the only way to gain access to the beta is by pre-ordering Sea of Thieves on PS5.

This may be deflating for anyone still on the fence about checking Sea of Thieves out, especially with it no longer being an Xbox/PC exclusive. It may be a live service, but Sea of Thieves is not free-to-play. At its cheapest, it’s still priced at $39.99/£39.99 on the Xbox and PlayStation storefronts. This works out for anyone who already pre-ordered Sea of Thieves, though, and there are a lot of people eager to play it on PS5. So many in fact that it quickly became the best-selling pre-order on the PS Store in the U.S.

If you do participate in the closed beta, you’ll earn an exclusive Dauntless Adventurer Sails cosmetic and Title, but Rare has warned in an FAQ on its website these are locked to the PS5 version of the game. So, even if you play Sea of Thieves on Xbox as well, you can’t transfer the sails and Title to your Xbox save file. The beta also doesn’t include cross-play, meaning you’ll only be interacting with other PS5 users (cross-play is a thing in the full game, don’t worry), and trophies will be disabled too. Trophy progress will still be tracked in the beta, though, so if you meet the conditions for unlocking them, you’ll do so upon booting up the full game.

The Pirate Emporium, where you can purchase Sea of Thieves‘ microtransactions like costumes and emotes, will be unavailable in the beta too. However, you will still earn rewards through the Season 11 Seasonal progression track, which you get to keep in the full game. Furthermore, you’ll automatically receive 10 levels of Renown for the Season 12 Seasonal progression track. Sea of Thieves launches for PS5 on April 30.