It’s been a few months since we launched Steam Deck, and we’re floored by the excitement we’ve seen as more and more customers receive their Steam Decks and share impressions. The team has loved seeing pictures and videos of where you’re using it, how you’re using it, how you’ve customized it, and what you’re playing. Keep it coming!

In the meantime, we've continued working through our own list of bugs to fix and features to add. We’ve also been paying attention to our customers, and a good number of the updates in the last couple months are directly due to customer feedback. Please keep that coming as well! Here's a quick overview of what we've shipped since our last video update, including the big update we shipped last week.

Lock Screen
Adding a lockscreen was a pretty hotly requested feature, from both outside and inside the company. Now players can set their PIN using the touchscreen or controls, and there are settings to have it show up on wake, boot, login, and/or when switching to Desktop mode. We think this will give folks a little more peace of mind, especially around grabby kids or siblings.

Keyboards
The onscreen keyboard for Steam Deck continues to get better. We’ve recently added more localized keyboards and now have a total of 26 languages and layouts supported. Players can enable multiple keyboards and toggle through them with the new globe key on the keyboard. Chinese / Japanese / Korean keyboards are currently being worked on, so watch out for those soon.

Achievements
The Achievements page has gotten a refresh for Steam Deck, making it faster to load and easier to navigate. Players can toggle between their stats and global stats or use the new drop down to compare their achievements with any friend who also plays.

Multiple Window Support
Steam Deck now supports games and applications that have multiple windows. Just push the Steam button while in-game, and the in-game overlay has new options to switch between active windows. This is especially useful for games and apps that might have multiple windows, like web browsers or games with launchers.

External Display
Work continues on making more external USB-C docks compatible with Steam Deck, as well as making our Steam Deck interface play nice with monitors of various sizes. We just shipped an update that makes the interface now scaled to a virtual 1280x800 resolution when shown on an external display, and we’re continuing to do work to improve external display support.

Per app performance profiles
Steam Deck comes with a ton of built in functionality to tweak settings like framerate (and soon refresh-rate), TDP, and more – for players who enjoy customizing their experience. We’ve recently added the ability to save settings per-game or app, so players don’t have to manually switch settings around between games. This works for both Steam games, as well as non-Steam games that have been added as shortcuts.

Offline mode
Offline mode has received some love in recent updates – it’s much quicker to switch in and out of Offline mode, it's easier to access, and a host of bugs that pop up only in Offline mode have been stomped.

Remote play
Remote Play on Steam Deck has also received some much needed updates, like making the system buttons on Deck work as expected, providing an in-UI option to stop streaming, and adding streamed games to the Recently Played list on the homescreen.

Remote Play Together
Remote Play Together (join someone else's game as if you're sitting next to them on the couch, but virtually) is now completely functional on Steam Deck. This includes both hosting and joining Remote Play Together sessions.

Updated Fan Behavior
Steam Deck now has a new OS-controlled fan curve, which means that it’s smarter, more responsive, and much quieter in low usage scenarios. And for those of you who prefer the old fan behavior, you can always switch back to it in Settings > System. We're continuing to work on improvements, so let us know what you think.

Adjustable Refresh Rate
The in-game screen refresh rate can now be adjusted on the fly anywhere between 40-60Hz. This feature is a game changer for finding that perfect balance between framerate, game quality, and battery life. And of course, you can set and save this on a per-game basis.

More OS updates
There are a bunch of other updates we've made on an OS level, including a higher max speaker volume, more internal screen resolution options for games to choose from, quick formats for microSD cards, and more.

SD Card Support
The team has done a bunch of work on SD card functionality as well, like making them usable as boot devices, improving formatting times, and adding a check to detect potentially counterfeit SD cards before formatting.

Windows support
A few important updates have shipped in the last couple months, making Windows a better experience on Steam Deck for those who want to go that route. We’ve shipped an update that added fTPM support, enabling Windows 11 installation. We’ve also just shipped audio drivers for both Win10 and 11 – you can find all that information here.

And more
There are a plethora of other changes and fixes that came to Steam Deck, like adding the Steam hardware survey, making life better for customers with gigantic Steam libraries, adding pinned notifications for certain notification types, a bunch of updates to the controller configurator, and a host of other quality of life fixes. All of these changes and more you can read all about in the detailed patch note posts here.

Deck Verified
Last up, a quick update on the Deck Verified program: We recently crossed 3,000 Playable and Verified titles on Steam Deck.

We're continuing to test new releases and older titles at a steady clip, while also working on the underlying technology. The team recently shipped Proton-7.0-2, adding and improving support for a bunch of titles, and is already hard at work on 7.0-3.

Speaking of game support, it's important to emphasize that compatibility across titles is improving not due just to our work here, but also thanks to the incredible efforts developers are putting in. Ordered by user playtime on Deck, the top ten titles of the last month* are all Verified, but that's only because of work taking place across the industry: four of these ten titles used to be either Unsupported or Playable, and still would be without devs doing the work to improve the experience for Deck customers. While we're highlighting these titles here, this same work is happening all over the giant Steam back-catalog.

That’s all she wrote
That’s it for today’s update, but as always there’s more on the way!


* Aperture Desk Job, The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth, Elden Ring, Hades, No Man's Sky, Rogue Legacy 2, Slay the Spire, Stardew Valley, Vampire Survivors, and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. We hope the breadth of games in this list is as exciting for you as it is for us.

Hi all. Due to parts shortages and COVID closures at our manufacturing facilities, the official Steam Deck Docking Station is delayed. We're working on improving the situation and will share more info when we have it. This has no effect on production schedule and reservation windows for Steam Decks (different parts, different factories).

In the meantime the team is continuing to work on improving the docked experience for Steam Deck with all USB-C hubs and external displays.

Hello! We've just shipped an update to SteamOS - we're up to 3.2 now, and it's full of some great updates and improvements to Steam Deck.

Refresh Rate
Players now have the option to adjust the in-game screen refresh rate on the fly. The default is 60Hz (which can be frame-limited to 60, 30, and 15fps), but you can now slide it down to 40Hz (with frame limits at 40, 20, and 10fps). Or any number (integer) between those two settings. This feature is great for finding that perfect balance between framerate, game quality, and battery life. Pro-tip, we have found that 40Hz tends to be a sweet spot for responsiveness, consistency, and smoothness*. And of course, you can save this setting on a per-game basis.

Fan Behavior
The team has been hard at work on Steam Deck's fan behavior, and this update has an all-new OS-controlled fan curve. This means that overall it's smarter, more responsive to what's happening on and inside Steam Deck, and quieter - especially in low usage situations. This has been tested extensively, and we're continuing to work on improvements - so please let us know what you think. If you prefer the way the fan used to work, you can always switch back to the old (BIOS-controlled) fan behavior in System > Settings.

Other bits and bobs
SteamOS 3.2 also includes more internal screen resolution options for games to choose from, quick formats for microSD cards, and audio improvements - max speaker volume now goes even higher!

Big thanks to the community for helping us test all these changes in the OS Beta channel. For more info about this update, view the full patch notes here.

Remote Play Together
This feature isn't actually part of the SteamOS 3.2 update (it's a Steam Client update), but it's still a big deal, and is also something that we shipped today. Remote Play Together (the feature that allows a friend to join your game remotely as if they are sitting on a couch next to you) is now completely functional on Steam Deck. This includes both hosting and joining Remote Play Together sessions. Try out a supported game and open the Quick Access Menu to get started. Details about this, and all the other Steam Client updates can be found here.

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*
More nerdy details about the refresh rate change.
So 30hz = 33.33 ms/frame, and 60hz = 16.66ms/frame. Meanwhile, 40hz is 25 ms/frame. So while it might seem a bit counter intuitive, 40fps is exactly half-way between 30 fps and 60 fps in terms of update speed, and as such looks and feels far more responsive than 30fps. Generally speaking you always want a very stable frame pacing. So having a rock solid 40hz is better than oscillating between 42 and 48 hz, especially if your screen refresh is 60hz. This is because you're only actually getting a new frame each 1/60th of a second, so every time you miss, you get a double frame, leading to judder.

So a rock solid 40fps in game, with a 40hz updating screen, means every frame is a new frame and as a result it can feel smoother than an inconsistent framerate with a higher screen refresh. In addition, locking framerate lower puts less demand on the system and thus saves battery. While 40hz will use more battery than 30hz, it will use less than a game capped at a higher refresh, while still giving a subjectively far higher quality of an experience comparitively.