Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Cloud Gaming expands to PC & iOS in 2021

Surprise! Microsoft found a way to bring its innovative cloud gaming service to iOS after all. The company unveiled the news in a blog post on the Xbox Wire which you should check out. It has a lot more details about the popular Xbox Game Pass service.

Project xCloud exited its beta phase earlier this summer to the excitement of millions of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate users. It came as a free upgrade to all subscribers which is already a crazy value on its own.

It allowed users to play a large library of games everywhere on their Android devices. Of course, a sufficient internet connection provided. But once that hurdle is taken, you can literally have console-quality gaming on the go.

Expanding Xbox to new players is central to our ambition of helping games and developers find an easy path to the world’s 3 billion gamers. We are doing this by embracing multiple devices and providing a consistent Xbox experience wherever you log in

A very unfortunate occurrence was that Apple did not allow Microsoft to enable cloud gaming on their mobile platforms. Truly a heavy punch for many Apple users who wanted to use xCloud on their devices.

Today we learn, that Microsoft found a way around it. Unlike Android, iOS users will be able to enjoy cloud gaming via the browser. Microsoft targets Spring 2021 to launch iOS support. But PC users should also be excited.

Cloud gaming via Xbox Game Pass Ultimate will further come to PC around the same time. Sure, xCloud on PC arguably makes more sense on low-power PCs and laptops. After all, there are a lot of PC users with no gaming PCs. For them, cloud gaming could open up brand-new opportunities. On the PC, xCloud will be offered both through the Xbox app and web browser.