Valve is “hard at work” on Steam Deck 2

Valve’s next-gen Steam Deck is in development, but it won’t launch soon

Valve has confirmed that its Steam Controller is launching next week, but that’s not the only piece of hardware that Valve’s working on. The Steam Machine and Steam Frame are still due to launch this year, and Valve is already working on its next-generation Steam Deck 2 handheld.

The original Steam Deck is now four years old, and it remains a great PC gaming handheld. While Valve’s Pierre-Loup Griffais has confirmed that they are “hard at work” on its successor, it won’t be releasing this year. Valve has stated previously that it is waiting for a worthwhile hardware upgrade.

We’re hard at work on it. And obviously every step of the way, if you look at our hardware projects over the years, you can draw a straight line from the original Steam Controller and Steam Machine to Steam Deck, to everything that we’re announcing and shipping this year. And we expect Steam Deck 2 will be a lot of the same where a lot of what we’re doing here will be learnings that build up to it.

– Pierre-Loup Griffais, Valve (via IGN)

For its next-generation Steam Deck, Valve isn’t just waiting for more hardware performance. Valve wants much higher performance while delivering a similar or longer battery life. Right now, there isn’t a new SOC that delivers exactly what Valve wants.

We’re not interested in getting to a point where it’s 20 or 30 or even 50% more performance at the same battery life. We want something a little bit more demarcated than that. So we’ve been working back from silicon advancements and architectural improvements, and I think we have a pretty good idea of what the next version of Steam Deck is going to be, but right now there’s no offerings in that landscape, in the SoC [System on a Chip] landscape, that we think would truly be a next-gen performance Steam Deck.

– Pierre-Loup Griffais (in 2025), Valve (via IGN)

Leaks from 2025 suggest that Valve plans to release its new Steam Deck in 2028. This timing will allow Valve to benefit from a large technological leap. If Valve sticks with AMD silicon, it should benefit from newer hardware architectures and lithography nodes. In theory, Valve’s Steam Deck could move from having an AMD Zen 2 CPU and RDNA 2 GPU to having a Zen 6 CPU with RDNA 5 graphics.

Right now, Valve’s likely focusing on the design of its Steam Deck 2 and its hardware and software. We will likely see some of what’s coming with Valve’s Steam Machine, which may launch with new software features. Since the Steam Machine 2’s processor isn’t ready yet, Valve is likely working on aspects like its shape, battery technology, cooling, and controller design.

You can join the discussion on Valve’s Steam Deck 2 plans on the OC3D Forums.