The Steam Machine is officially expensive and not widely available

Few people expected anything different – people following what’s been happening in the PC component market anyway – but it’s still troubling to see and even harder to accept: Valve, having no good options left, is launching the Steam Machine at price points that are significantly higher most of us had braced for. What’s more, availability will be so low at first – regardless of configuration and cost – that this is basically more of a paper launch than anything else. Definitely not the kind of launch an ambitious product would need to have in 2026 if it was to disrupt a market as mature as living room gaming in any case.

Just as yours truly predicted back in late May, Valve’s device is offered in four different configurations, depending on storage capacity and whether it comes with the new Steam controller or not. The most affordable Steam Machine costs $1049 (512GB SSD/no Steam controller), with the rest of the SKUs getting even pricier: $1128 (512GB SSD/w Steam controller), $1349 (2TB/no Steam controller) and $1428 (2TB/w Steam controller). The 2TB configurations come with two extra faceplates (red fabric/solid walnut). Pricing in other countries is just about the same or even a bit higher, depending on currency exchange rates and additional taxes.

Probably because getting to the mainboard of the Steam Machine in order to access its two RAM slots is a more involved process than installing or swapping out its SSD, Valve did not make a barebones configuration – no RAM, no SSD, no controller – available after all. That would have greatly reduced the perceived point-of-entry of the Steam Machine, offering consumers familiar with PC hardware an extra option… but the company did not go for it. Whether it intends to do so in the future is unclear, but Valve did confirm it’s working with iFixit for full service Steam Machine online guides, so there’s some hope it might at some point.

The fact that there will be a limited number of Steam Machines available at launch – nobody knows for sure how many and Valve is not telling – only adds salt to their pricing injury. The company is currently accepting preorders (one per household), but all that the preordering process actually guarantees is a place in a queue. The preorder window will close on June 25th – then, on June 29th, randomly selected consumers will receive e-mails to confirm and complete their order, while the rest will receive an e-mail letting them know that they’ve been simply added to a waitlist (presumably for the next batch of Steam Machines). Shipping will begin shortly after.

This is definitely not how we imagined the Steam Machine’s launch would play out back in November 2025 – Valve themselves are aware and not exactly thrilled either – yet… here we are: it’s hard not to feel that one of the most promising initiatives in modern gaming is now unlikely to succeed, even if Valve ultimately had to make the Steam Machine available sooner rather than later for a number of different reasons. But asking for more than $1000 for an entry-level PC – one that was meant to work as an alternative to a PS5 or an Xbox Series X… in theory – does not leave much room for optimism: the Steam Machine is a costly reference system for an emerging gaming platform, but that is basically it. Which, all things considered, is simply not enough.

The Steam Machine obviously comes with several quality-of-life features and competitive advantages over a similarly configured DIY PC anyone can build and install SteamOS on – that much is true and many of its early reviews were right to point that out. But consumers commenting online currently seem so put off by the price points the Steam Machine is offered at, that it’s hard to imagine it being a notable commercial hit even if availability wasn’t an issue. What’s worse, if the pricing Valve had to go with for the Steam Machine is any indication, then the possibility of other manufacturers stepping in to offer more affordable variants of their own now seems even further away than before.

The hope, of course, is that SteamOS will be in such great shape – after a steady stream of updates and fixes Valve is sure to provide over time – that, when the AI bubble eventually bursts and RAM/SSD pricing returns to sensible levels, plenty of companies will be interested in releasing Steam Machine-like devices. It’s nice to have such hopes, sure, but it would be much nicer if the Steam Machine was able to deliver on its promise to disrupt living room gaming in ways that would benefit consumers in 2025-2026 terms. If we all have to wait until 2028 for gaming PCs running Valve’s operating system to actually become competitive, by that point it will be time for the next PlayStation or the next Xbox to move the goal posts again. Oh, the irony.