At long last, Valve’s new headset is here. The maker of the Steam Deck has finally unveiled its long-rumored “Deckard” headset, which is actually called the Steam Frame, alongside its Steam Machine console. While the VR/XR headset field is now saturated with big names like Apple, Meta, and most recently, Samsung, Valve hopes to carve out a niche next to Sony and its PSVR 2 by making the Steam Frame more about gaming than anything else.
The Steam Frame, which is wireless unlike the Valve Index from 2019, obviously takes advantage of Steam in a big way, and can stream your whole Steam library. Naturally, that means the Steam Frame is for VR gaming, obviously, but also non-VR gaming, if you’re just looking to put the headset on and use it as a big ol’ virtual screen.
© Valve
If you saw “streaming” and rolled your eyes, I don’t blame you. Anyone who’s ever streamed games knows that the experience can be aggravating depending on your connection and how stable it is. But before you write the Steam Frame off, it’s worth considering that Valve seems to have gone to some lengths to ensure that its Steam Frame delivers a serviceable streaming experience. Included with the Steam Frame is a 6GHz dongle that uses two separate radio signals to make the connection more stable. One of those radios is dedicated to streaming audio and graphics, while the other is meant for your Wi-Fi router. This setup, according to Valve, also helps ensure there’s no competition for bandwidth.
That’s not the only trick Valve is using to optimize the streaming part of the Steam Frame. Valve says its headset will also use something called foveated streaming, which leverages eye tracking to optimize the part of the screen you’re actually looking at. Valve claims that this technique offers a “10x improvement in image quality and effective bandwidth” over standard streaming, and it’s all happening “behind the scenes” and “without you noticing.” On the surface, it sounds like a pretty ingenious way to upgrade the streaming experience, but obviously, we’ll have to test that for ourselves before we declare it a breakthrough.
If streaming isn’t your thing, the Steam Frame does support standalone play, too. The headset runs SteamOS and is powered by a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip with 16GB of RAM. There are 256GB and 1TB storage options, and that’s expandable with an optional microSD card. Valve doesn’t offer a battery life estimate, but it says that the Steam Frame uses a 21.6Wh battery that charges via USB-C. As far as weight goes, Valve has Meta beat. The Steam Frame is 440g with the main headset and headstrap, while the Quest 3 is 515g with both included.
Inside the Steam Frame, Valve is using custom pancake lenses that offer a 2,160 x 2,160 resolution per eye and a refresh rate of between 72Hz and 144Hz. Oh, and the screen has a 110-degree field of view, which is the same as the Quest 3. If you had micro OLED panels on your wishlist, I’m sorry to say the Steam Frame doesn’t have it. Valve is using LCD panels this go-around, which may not be as premium as displays on the Vision Pro or Samsung’s Galaxy XR headset, but will at least help keep the cost down (hopefully).
© Valve
In the spirit of VR gaming, the Steam Frame is shipping with controllers, tracked by the four cameras on the outside of the headset. Valve’s controllers look similar to what you would get with the Meta Quest, though the right controller has A, B, X, Y buttons, and the left controller has a D-pad. Both controllers offer tracking, and Valve says the joysticks are magnetic, which should alleviate any worries about drift.
Two critical bits of information we don’t have about the Steam Frame so far are the price and release date, though Valve has said it will share more on that front in 2026. In the meantime, it’s at least clear that Valve is offering a spin on the typical VR headset experience by leaning into streaming, which (if executed well) could make the act of gaming in a headset feel more seamless. VR headsets might be in a rough place, but I have to say, Valve might be bringing me back into the fold.
