The Handhelds That Got Me Through The Year
2025 was a tough year. These five handhelds made it a little more fun.
A Year Worth Escaping From
2025 wasn’t an easy year — for me or for the world in general. Handheld gaming became something of a lifeline: a reliable way to step away from the noise and disappear into an imaginary world for a while. This isn’t a roundup of the best devices that launched in 2025. It’s a tribute to the five handhelds that actually got me through the year, whatever year they came out.
AYN Thor — Handheld of the Year
The Thor is my favourite handheld of 2025 by some distance. On the surface it resembles a Nintendo DS, but you don’t need to be a DS enthusiast to get enormous value out of it. The 6-inch top OLED is among the best displays I’ve ever gamed on — vibrant, sharp, and genuinely stunning. Below it sits a 3.92-inch OLED that can be used independently or combined with the top screen for dual-screen gaming. That flexibility means the Thor handles almost any form factor you throw at it: GBA games on the bottom screen, PS1 on top, or native 3DS gaming across both.
Windows emulation on Android has come on considerably, so lightweight Steam games are now viable on the Thor too. Pair all of that with the clamshell form factor and up to eight hours of battery life, and you’ve got something genuinely confident to travel with. It’s the device I packed for Christmas at my in-laws — perfect for a couple of hours of cosy gaming after the kids have gone to bed. The fact that you can also access streaming subscriptions and VPN apps on it is a genuinely useful bonus.
Legion Go S — The House Powerhouse
For raw handheld PC performance at a price that doesn’t require a second mortgage, the Legion Go S is hard to beat. I’ve got the Z1 Extreme version running SteamOS, and it’s become my daily driver for gaming around the house. The 8-inch LCD display challenges everything you thought you knew about non-OLED screens, and the ergonomics are arguably the best in the category. Games like Metaphor: ReFantazio and Indiana Jones and the Great Circle run beautifully on it.
Its limitations are real, though. The fans get loud under load, and the battery life is poor enough that I rarely take it out of the house — a trip to Barcelona taught me that lesson when it died before I even reached my destination. But as an at-home handheld PC at a still-reasonable price point, it’s an exceptional machine.
Nintendo Switch 2 — Complicated, But Undeniable
I’ll be honest: the Switch 2 didn’t live up to expectations. The display is fairly underwhelming, it’s uncomfortable to hold without a grip, and the game library still feels thin. And yet it’s the handheld I’ve spent the most time with since it launched. That’s largely down to Yakuza 0: Director’s Cut shipping with it — a series I’d never have explored otherwise, and one I promptly became obsessed with for the rest of the year. I’m now through to Yakuza: Like a Dragon 2 with the third entry due in February.
The Pokémon Scarlet and Violet update finally prompted me to finish the DLC, and being able to play competitive Pokémon on a bigger, brighter screen was genuinely enjoyable. What the Switch 2 still needs is more software like Donkey Kong Bananza — games that actually justify its existence rather than things that could have run on the original. It feels like a Switch Pro for now. But I’m glad I have one.
PlayStation Portal — A Slow Burner That Came Good
The Portal launched to a fairly muted reception, and that was fair at the time. But compare it today to what it was at launch and it’s almost a different device. We’ve gone from simple PS5 streaming to accessing PlayStation’s broader game library and, for those with a PlayStation Premium subscription, even a selection of your own digital purchases — no PS5 required. It’s a remarkable turnaround.
What the Portal does better than any streaming alternative is feel like a proper controller. Because it’s essentially a DualSense split in two, you get the full haptics and adaptive trigger experience that makes PlayStation’s controllers so distinctive. That targeted, console-quality feel is why I’d always reach for the Portal over streaming via an app on a Steam Deck. Wi-Fi reliability has improved significantly with updates too, and you can now troubleshoot your connection directly on the device, which helps.
iPad Mini — Don’t Sleep on It
For anyone not ready to commit to a dedicated handheld, the iPad Mini deserves more credit than it gets as a gaming device. I’ve gone back and forth on the iPad’s identity over the years, but the Mini sidesteps all of that — it’s just a brilliant, compact tablet that happens to be very good for gaming.
Snap on a controller like the Backbone One or my personal favourite, the EVO Vagabond — which is light, well-balanced, and makes no real compromises on quality — and you’ve got something that feels genuinely comfortable to hold for extended sessions. The game library is broader than people assume: Red Dead Redemption is now on iOS, Football Manager 26 Touch scratches a particular itch, and if you have a Netflix subscription, a decent selection of games comes included. Emulators run on it too. It’s versatile, approachable, and worth taking seriously.
Here’s to whatever 2026 brings — and to the devices that’ll help us get through it.