PS5 System Language Research

Documentation and minimal C++ code for reading the language selected in PlayStation 5 system settings.

Quick start

Include include/ps5_system_language.hpp, link the PS5 Payload SDK's SceSystemService stub, and call:

const std::string_view locale = ps5::i18n::current_language_tag();

For a prospero.mk project, add the library to the existing link list:

LDADD += -lSceSystemService

The header calls:

sceSystemServiceParamGetInt(1, &language);

Parameter ID 1 requests the system language. The function returns 0 on success and writes the selected language ID to language. The helper returns en-US if the call fails or the firmware returns an unknown value.

Language IDs

ID	System language	BCP 47 tag
0	Japanese	ja-JP
1	English (United States)	en-US
2	French (France)	fr-FR
3	Spanish (Spain)	es-ES
4	German	de-DE
5	Italian	it-IT
6	Dutch	nl-NL
7	Portuguese (Portugal)	pt-PT
8	Russian	ru-RU
9	Korean	ko-KR
10	Chinese (Traditional)	zh-Hant
11	Chinese (Simplified)	zh-Hans
12	Finnish	fi-FI
13	Swedish	sv-SE
14	Danish	da-DK
15	Norwegian	nb-NO
16	Polish	pl-PL
17	Portuguese (Brazil)	pt-BR
18	English (United Kingdom)	en-GB
19	Turkish	tr-TR
20	Spanish (Latin America)	es-419
21	Arabic	ar
22	French (Canada)	fr-CA
23	Czech	cs-CZ
24	Hungarian	hu-HU
25	Greek	el-GR
26	Romanian	ro-RO
27	Thai	th-TH
28	Vietnamese	vi-VN
29	Indonesian	id-ID
30	Ukrainian	uk-UA

Values 0 through 29 follow the established SystemService ABI. Value 30 is community-documented and should be verified on the target firmware. Applications must retain an unknown-value fallback because later firmware may add values.

Loading translations

Keep the platform lookup separate from the application's translation fallback rules:

const auto locale = ps5::i18n::current_language_tag();

if (!load_translations(locale))
    load_translations("en-US");

Applications supporting fewer regions can deliberately collapse tags. For example, en-US and en-GB may both load an en resource, while zh-Hans and zh-Hant should normally remain distinct.

Evidence and scope

• sceSystemServiceParamGetInt with parameter ID 1 is used by a public PS5 project; that implementation also uses IDs 10 and 11 for Traditional and Simplified Chinese.
• The OrbisSystemParamLanguage definitions document the stable values 0 through 29 inherited by the interface.
• The community LibSceSystemService language table records Ukrainian as value 30, but labels it unverified.

This repository documents a narrow compatibility technique. It does not claim that every listed language was tested on every PS5 firmware.

License and notices

Copyright © 2026 BlackBearReloaded. Licensed under GPL-3.0-or-later; see LICENSE.

This is a personal hobby project. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Sony Interactive Entertainment or any other company named here. Product names are trademarks of their owners and are used only to describe compatibility.

Provided as is, without warranty. Nothing here is legal advice.