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Valve has announced a new Steam Machine, a new Steam Controller for that console, and a Steam Frame VR headset. It’s Valve’s largest leap into gaming hardware since the Steam Deck became a hit.
The company’s first generation of Steam Machines couldn’t get much attention back in 2015, but with portable technology proven and a big PC ecosystem already in place, Valve seems primed to go after PlayStation and Xbox once again.
From a cube-shaped console to put in your living room to a high-end stand-alone VR headset, the company is clearly framing its ecosystem as a family of hardware unified around both flat-screen and virtual-reality gaming.
Steam Machine Details
Steam Machine runs SteamOS, and has access to the entire Steam library. Steam Machine will be available in two storage sizes: 512GB and 2TB. Both come with expandable storage with microSD.
Steam Machine full specs
- CPU: Semi-custom AMD Zen 4 6C / 12T up to 4.8 GHz, 30W TDP
- GPU: Semi-Custom AMD RDNA3 28CUs 2.45GHz max sustained clock, 110W TDP
- Supports 4K gaming at 60 FPS with FSR
- Ray tracing supported
- Over 6x more powerful than Steam Deck
- 16GB DDR5 + 8GB GDDR6 VRAM
- micro SD card slot for expanded storage/ portable catalog
- Internal power supply, AC power 110-240V
Furthermore, the console is adapted for all the peripherals and monitors:
- 1 Gigabit Ethernet.
- DisplayPort 1.4.
- HDMI 2.0.
- One USB-C and four USB-A ports.
Steam Machine also features 2x2 Wi-Fi 6E, plus Bluetooth 5.3 with a dedicated antenna. Steam Controller's wireless adapter is built right into Steam Machine for direct pairing.
Steam Machine Performance
Steam Machine has two AMD chips as well as 16GB of DDR5 RAM. The CPU is a six-core AMD Zen 4 chip with up to 30 watts of headroom and 4.8GHz boost, while the GPU is a semi-custom AMD RDNA 3 “Navi 33” GPU, with 28 compute units, up to 130-watt TDP, and 8GB of GDDR6 memory.
These are unusual parts for a gaming PC, but they may complement one another well. While the latter doesn’t have a direct PC counterpart, the closest would be AMD’s Radeon RX 7700 and 7600 mobile GPUs, which have shown up almost exclusively in external graphics cards (two exceptions noted) and which have similar or better theoretical performance than the PS5 Pro’s GPU.
Steam Machine Price and Release Date
Valve says it hasn’t determined pricing details yet. But when asked if the console will be more expensive than a PS5 Pro, Valve response was: “Steam Machine’s pricing is comparable to a PC with similar specs.”
Some analysis suggest that Steam Machine will cost between $650 and $750, putting it right in line with similarly equipped consoles like the Xbox Series X Digital Edition ($599) and the PS5 Pro ($749). Bundles with the new Steam Controller will likely be more, but Valve could very well subsidize this further to drive take rate.
Valve has set an early 2026 release for the Steam Machine and associated hardware. This gives them a few months to firm up pricing and work through possible supply chain constraints.
Steam Frame
In addition to the console itself, Valve also unveiled the Steam Frame, its new VR headset. Instead of being tethered to a PC like previous models, the Frame is a standalone headset with an ARM chip, that can run flat-screen Windows games natively from internal storage, or on a microSD card.
The Steam Frame is capable of streaming PC games to the headset over a high-bandwidth wireless dongle that “eliminates the bandwidth bottlenecks that plague Wi-Fi”. The new controllers also have adaptive inputs for both VR and flat-screen games, in an attempt to “fill the divide between the two”.
The Next-Gen Steam Controller
Valve also presented the second-generation Steam Controller, a Bluetooth-compatible gamepad for the Steam Machine, Steam Frame, and any PC with Steam.
Steam Controller comes with magnetic thumbsticks using TMR technology, designed for improved feel, responsiveness and long-term reliability. They also support capacitive touch to enable motion controls.
It ships with a puck-shaped wireless receiver that also works as a charging dock. The price has yet to be confirmed, but Valve’s engineers say that the Steam Controller will be “competitive” with other high-end controllers when it launches in early 2026.
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