Valve Reaffirms The Steam Machine Is Still Coming This Year

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The AI industry has been hurting almost all aspects of the tech industry, and that includes gamers. I have been seeing reports of PlayStation's changes to its PC strategy, and they are even trying out Dynamic Pricing for their products, but it has also affected Valve. Not only has the Steam Deck been periodically out of stock due to the RAM and SSD shortages coming from AI companies, but the new hardware they announced (the Steam Machine, Steam Frame, and Steam Controller) has effectively been pushed back.

Originally, the new hardware was supposed to be coming early this year, and by now, we should have had at least a price or release date confirmed. However, Valve pushed it back, moving to the first half of 2026. Now, Valve seems to be pushing it back a little further, but they are still confirming that the hardware will be coming this year.

Valve posted its Steam Year in Review for 2025 on Steam, and in the first section, they double down that their hardware will be coming in 2026, despite the RAM and SSD challenges. However, while this is great of them to do, the wording is actually pushing back what they said before, going from the first half of 2026 to "this year." On top of that, this news post was edited to say "this year" and originally mentioned that they "hope to ship in 2026."

I am happy to know that Valve still plans to ship the new hardware this year, especially with Xbox's Project Helix most likely competing in the same space, but I am a little worried. Seemingly moving the release window so many times in such a short span makes figuring out when the products will launch much harder, and as someone excited for them, I am a little sad. Still, I understand the crisis coming from AI, and I can only hope we get more news sooner rather than later.

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