Elden Ring Pre-Load Opens on Xbox Consoles

Owners of the Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and Xbox One consoles can now start to pre-load Elden Ring, From Software’s new action-RPG. Players who’ve pre-purchased the game on those platforms can download it ahead of its planned February 25, 2022 release date. The PS5 pre-load will begin closer to its release day.[Thanks, Game Watch].

Pre-loading is the practice of downloading a purchased digital copy of a game prior to release, so that a player doesn’t have to wait long to play when it unlocks. As game download sizes have grown, pre-loading is a useful option for players with limited time or slower internet connections. Of course, pre-load game files are generally inaccessible until launch day, when the console typically downloads the final part of the game, finalizes installation, and applies a purchase authentication.

The Elden Ring pre-load files will take up about 49GB of space on a player’s Xbox console. It’s a fairly moderate size for a modern major release, though the addition of “day one” patches or content may increase demands on storage. Storage has become something of an issue with modern consoles, thanks to the rise of digital game-buying. New consoles like the Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5 also employ high-speed solid state drives (SSDs) as their internal storage devices, as well. However, SSDs generally have lower storage space than hard disk drives. This limits the default storage space available to typically under one terabyte, limiting available space for big games without expansion.

Elden Ring releases on PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, and PS5 on February 25, 2022. Check out the game’s minimum system requirements on PC.