Valve is launching its new Steam Frame VR headset at a time when new virtual reality game releases on its platform are at a decade low. The company hopes this new hardware will help to 'rekindle the excitement' for PCVR, a segment of the market that has seen a significant decline in content compared to standalone VR platforms.
While standalone headsets like the Meta Quest series now dominate the Steam Hardware Survey, accounting for over 60% of devices, Valve engineer Jeremy Selan notes that many of these users are still engaging with PCVR content. "There is a real draw with PCVR even today amongst the millions and millions of VR headsets out there, and that's, I believe, because there's a lot of unique VR content that can only be accessed with the capabilities and power of the PC and the experimentation that comes on it," Selan stated.
The decline in PCVR game releases is stark. Data from SteamDB indicates that VR game releases peaked around 2017 and have been in decline since. 2025 saw only 481 VR games released on Steam, a figure not seen since 2015. In contrast, VR game releases accounted for 15% of all Steam releases in 2017, dropping to just 2% in 2025. This trend contrasts with the Quest Store, which has seen an increase in new releases annually since 2020.
The Steam Frame is designed to offer a dual experience, functioning as both a standalone VR headset powered by a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip and capable of streaming PCVR games wirelessly via a dedicated adapter. Valve hardware engineer Joy Lyons explained the strategy: "We think it's great for customers to have more access to different types of games... And we see this as a sort of a broadening and maturing of the market; sort of an opening of the tent to more potential customers, more potential gamers."
To support a wider range of content, the Steam Frame utilizes technologies like Proton for Windows games, FEX for running x86 games on its Arm chip, and Lepton for Android games. This approach aims to increase the library of games available on Steam, including mobile VR titles that may not have previously been accessible on the platform. "We wanted to, with the emulation, be able to have access to more games in the VR space," Lyons added.
Valve hopes that by improving the wireless PCVR streaming experience, the Steam Frame will encourage developers to create more content that leverages the power of PCs. "Our hope is that out of the box, obviously, no work is needed," Selan said. "Your existing catalog of VR titles on Steam will just work. But over time, as we sell more of these and the economics improve, we think this will give a new life to the ability to take advantage of the large compute of your PC while still having a great wireless VR experience."
While Valve has stated it has no new first-party VR titles in development, focusing instead on supporting partner games, the company remains committed to the PCVR community. "We love the PCVR community," Lyons reiterated. "We always will. This is our heritage. These are our customers, and we see this as a great product for them. We made it for them. But we also want to grow a healthy ecosystem for both the gamers and the game developers."