The Xbox One will constantly record the last five minutes of gameplay, Microsoft has announced.

That’s according to Microsoft Studios creative director Ken Lobb, who mentioned the number while discussing the new Xbox One version of Killer Instinct at the San Diego Comic-Con (as reported by Eurogamer).

"The idea is you're always recording," said Lobb. "The last five minutes of any game you're playing are always being stored on your hard drive.

"Say you're playing online and you just did the best thing ever – you can't pause as you're playing online," he said.

"You can say 'Xbox, record that' and it'll grab the last 30 seconds of gameplay for you to play around with later."

That may seem a paltry figure when compared to the 15 minutes of recording touted by Sony for the PlayStation 4, except now that figure has been contradicted by Sony itself.

At a Develop 2013 talk in Brighton last week, Sony’s Neil Brown said the PlayStation 4 would record just seven minutes of footage. However, apparently the script he was reading off said “several” not “seven”.

Both the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 allow captured footage to be edited with titles and a voice-over, and the Xbox One can grab extra footage recorded using Kinect.

Both also allow game footage to be streamed online.

We've approached Sony for clarification on the PlayStation 4's DVR capabilities.