Steam Announces Three Pieces of Hardware Joining the Steam Deck — Everything You Need to Know

As a surprise announcement, Steam has rejoined (or doubled down?) on the hardware market, as Valve has announced three new hardware that will be launching. All designed with Steam and SteamOS in mind, the family is expanding to offer further ways to enjoy your content, and it's a pretty robust and inclusive market.

Here's everything you need to know!

Overview

First, let's talk a bit about all three pieces. Steam launched the Steam Deck a few years ago and has been expanding the market, not quite reaching "global" yet, as demand continues strong; so strong, in fact, that the Steam Deck is consistently among the top-selling Steam products every week, competing against Counter-Strike 2, new releases, and more.

The expansion is meant to be all-inclusive, opening the gates to console, VR, and the resurrection of the much-beloved (and now discontinued) Steam Controller. There are three hardware pieces:

• Steam Controller, which will pair seamlessly with all of the devices and is a successor to the previous one.
• Steam Machine, which is a console approach to Steam and Steam Deck, offering more power.
• Steam Frame, which is Steam's new VR headset.

Now, we'll talk about each of the pieces individually.

Everything You Need to Know About the Steam Controller

This piece of tech shares a lot of the DNA of the first Steam controller, though some of the inputs have been changed, adding joysticks, still keeping the two trackpads, and two additional buttons in the back. It's everything you'd expect from a Steam controller if Valve had been a console instead — designated Steam button, Quick Access menu, and PC compatibility.

Steam Controller is both wired and wireless, using the same puck that it comes with to connect to work as a wireless transmitter. It works as a charging station that magnetically connects to the Steam Controller and works wirelessly, but if you prefer more traditional options, like Bluetooth or USB, that's supported, too.

The Steam Controller comes with high-definition rumble and grip-enabled gyro (which Valve is calling Grip Sense): you can hold and release two buttons on the grips to enable or disable gyro, and you can also map those controllers to others, letting you use them as any other button.

In total, the Steam Controller comes with all of the inputs you'd expect, plus the additional trackpads, motion controls, four grip buttons on either side, and the two gyro grip buttons. Plus, a Steam button for enabling the Steam client and a Quick Access Menu button for notifications, friends, Steam Chat, and more (likely the way you'll interact with the recording).

This controller is built with Steam hardware in mind, but it'll work on anything that's running Steam or the Steam Link app: Windows, Mac, Linux PCS, tablets, and smartphones.

Everything You Need to Know About the Steam Machine

Steam Console Hardware

Steam entered the handheld market a few years ago and reigned triumphant, changing the industry forever. PC made affordable and transportable with SteamOS meant that players all around the world bought — and loved — their Steam Decks for its accessibility.

While implementation was wonky at first, with Steam verification and the early stages of SteamOS, Valve has since mastered the operating system, and while it's not flawless, it is a far cry and far more compatible than it once was. Now, Steam Hardware has set its sights on console gamers, introducing everyone to the glory of PC gaming in one, accessible box.

The Steam Machine has the power of six Steam Decks, making sure that it can play pretty much everything in the Steam library. While the actual specs haven't been announced, Valve boasts that 4k gaming at 60 FPS will be possible with a bit of a caveat: semi-custom AMD desktop class CPU and GPU, making it FSR compatible.

Using SteamOS for fast gaming, the Steam Machine will work best with a Steam Controller due to its incorporated Steam button to bring up the Steam client and interact with all of the Steam features (had enough Steam yet?). It's a self-feeding machine that'll give players the opportunity to engage with as much or as little as they want with Valve's client, but it makes it accessible and easy to use with a console-like user interface.

The console itself is a small, six-inch cube that'll fit anywhere, making it a powerful PC that you can set wherever you want. This also includes an LED strip at the front with a magnetic panel, letting you customise it however you want, making it a perfect fit for aesthetic.

The peripherals are full of things for you to interact with as well, making it compatible with most setups — here's what you need to know about its I/O:

• One Gigabit Ethernet.
• One DisplayPort 1.4.
• One HDMI 2.0.
• One USB C.
• Four USB A.

Everything comes in the neat box, with some of the most important ports in the front and powerful connectivity inside, too, offering the capability to connect with the Steam Controller and Wi-Fi 6E plus Bluetooth 5.3 via a dedicated antenna. It's chock-full, too, with the power brick included inside (so only one to plug in and get it working) and two storage sizes available: 512 GB and 2TB, both of which can be expanded via microSD.

Though Steam Machine is essentially marketed as a Steam console, it's actually just a PC — install the apps you want, play the games you want... even change the operating system! If you're keen on getting a Steam Machine to run on Windows and playing everything via the tiny box, Valve isn't going to stop you.

It's small enough that it'll work in any living space and desk, and the peripherals will give room to customise it to your heart's content. Though, it obviously works best with Steam content — made specifically for the Steam Controller, but also great for streaming to Steam Deck or the Steam Frame.

Everything You Need to Know About the Steam Frame

Steam VR Hardware

Finally, we have the Steam Frame, essentially the return of the Valve Index. The Steam Frame is sold as a streaming-first device, meaning that it's going to be entirely cable-free: you put it in your head and get into the VR game without much hassle.

It's designed for comfort and easy to put it — you strap the Steam Frame on and, according to the page, it's lightweight and compact, offering a balanced front-to-rear feeling. With no wires and no setup, it could be a great product to get into VR gaming without the hassle of pairing your preferred headset and getting it to recognise your area and work out of the box.

Included is a wireless adapter for dual radios, a 6GHz dongle that you connect for streaming that uses dual radios: one for streaming the audio and visuals, and the other that connects to the Wi-Fi. As a streaming-first headset, it needs a great connection to the internet and to make the most effective use of bandwidth, which Valve is attempting via a new feature.

Foveated Streaming is the way that Valve intends to make games look beautiful without sacrificing bandwidth — essentially, it looks at where you're looking and makes what you're looking at 10 times more in-depth, leaving everything else more pixelated where you won't notice it. It'll work directly for the entire Steam library, meaning that there's no need for additional setup from developers.

Using a pancake lens, both optics feature a 2160x2160 LCD display, one per eye, featuring 62–144 H to keep the quality as high as possible. Accompanying the visuals are two speakers on both sides of the headset, each oriented in the opposite direction to cancel out vibrations.

Finally, tracking is done via four high-resolution monochrome cameras that track both the headset and the controllers. With an infrared LED, this should work in dark environments, too.

The controllers have everything you'd expect from any VR one: various inputs held in both hands, including a middle-finger button to support additional movement and inputs often used in VR games. Using the VR's capability to track, they should work in the 3D space and be fully backwards compatible with the SteamVR catalogue.

One thing we've neglected to mention, however, is that Steam Frame is also built to play your Steam library in flat-picture mode. Putting on the headset, you can launch regular games and use the controllers, featuring normal inputs, to enjoy any game displayed on a flat screen in an environment. This means you can play on a bigger monitor than you might have at home with the comfort of the Steam Frame and the privacy of one, too. Both controllers use a single AA battery that's easy to replace and should offer hours of uninterrupted playtime.

If you're not a fan of streaming, then fret not — Steam Frame is its own standalone PC running SteamOS powered by a Snapdragon 8 Series Processor. Featuring 18GB of RAM, the Steam Frame can run games itself if you don't want to stream from your PC or Steam Machine, completely removing the need to stream games for those that are compatible with the headset standalone.

Where Will the Steam Controller, Steam Machine, and Steam Frame Ship?

All three hardware products will ship where the Steam Deck is currently shipping. Meaning that you can get it in the following regions:

• United States
• Canada
• United Kingdom
• Europe
• Australia

All regions covered by KOMODO will also be able to receive the three hardware devices:

• Japan
• South Korea
• Hong Kong
• Taiwan

When Will the Steam Controller, Steam Machine, and Steam Frame be Available?

Those who are anxious to get their hands on the new hardware should know that shipping will be in early 2026, but specific information — including pricing and launch timing — won't be available until after 2026. Until then, we don't have much more information other than early 2026 for shipping.