Valve rules out releasing a new Steam Deck model every year

Valve has confirmed that it won’t offer annual Steam Deck refreshes, stating that doing so would be "unfair" to consumers. Speaking to Reviews.org ahead of the much-delayed launch of Steam Deck in Australia, Valve also stated that the Steam Deck 2 will offer a "generational leap."

Steam Deck designer Lawrence Yang told Reviews.org, "We really do want to wait for a generational leap in compute without sacrificing battery life before we ship the real second generation of Steam Deck. But it is something that we’re excited about and we’re working on."

"What we said when we launched the OLED was that this is not a second-generation device," added Yang, when asked whether the OLED model was a yearly refresh. "This is what we would say is what we wish we had shipped originally for Steam Deck [LCD], and I think that has been borne out."

Below Deck

The Steam Deck launched released in Europe and America in February 2022—before later expanding to Japan, Hong Kong and Taiwan—with an OLED model launching in 2023. Nearly three years later, neither model is available in Australia, with the portable gaming devices finally hitting the Australian market in November.

Steam Deck designer Yazan Aldehayyat, stated that the reason for the lengthy delay to the Australian launch was that Valve "did not have a sales channel in Australia" While Valve has yet to release exact sales figures for the console, the company claims that the device has sold "multiple millions."