By Valve has just pushed a big Steam Client update to the stable channel, and it brings a lot to the Steam Deck. Several features I’ve been testing in the beta have now made it to everyone, alongside a big round of Remote Play improvements, Steam Input changes and new Steam Controller firmware. Here’s what stands out to me.
Big Art Mode and Personal Calendar on the Home Screen
The first new feature is Big Art Mode for the home screen. You can turn it on by going to Settings > Home and flipping the toggle, and it gives your recent games much larger artwork. This was previously in the beta, so it’s great to see it arrive in the official update.
The Recommended tab on the home screen also now shows a Personal Calendar, so you can see at a glance which games are launching. Again, this is something we saw in the beta first, and it’s a neat addition now that it’s official.
Screensavers
Screensavers are now available under Settings > Customization, with two options to choose from. The default is a game art slideshow that pulls artwork from your recently played games and your recent in-game screenshots, while the second is a retro-inspired bouncing Steam logo. Custom screensavers are supported too, and there’s a new setting to disable the screensaver while you’re in game.
Remote Play gets Pyrowave
If you use Remote Play, this is one of the most impressive parts of the update. Valve has added an experimental video codec called Pyrowave, designed for high-bandwidth, low-latency streaming, and you can enable it with a toggle at the bottom of the Remote Play settings. That’s a nice boost if you stream from your PC or Steam Machine to the Steam Deck. Remote Play also gets improved color accuracy, clarity and brightness, greatly improved Vulkan capture performance, and an automatic fallback to H.264 when HEVC isn’t available.
General improvements and fixes
There’s now a Default to Desktop Mode toggle in the System settings, so you can have the Deck boot straight into desktop mode if that’s how you prefer to use it. Download speeds have been improved on high-latency connections, and on a Steam Machine, pressing the controller’s system button will ask your TV to switch to it as the active source, as long as the TV supports HDMI CEC.
On the fixes side, Windows games no longer show as Not Compatible in the library until you manually pick a Proton version, and the Suspend Download Throttle option now updates properly on the downloads page. Desktop mode also gets several fixes, including the desktop controller config now being applied in the desktop overlay, plus fixes for game recording playback.
Steam Input and Steam Controller firmware
Steam Input has had a huge amount added in this update, including a new action-based view in the configurator for Steam Input API games, a new multi-binding page for button combinations, better CPU performance and more consistent trackpad sensitivity between the Steam Deck and Steam Controller.
The Steam Controller also gets new firmware that adds a second Bluetooth LE pairing slot, so you can now keep it paired to two devices and switch between them. The firmware also improves rumble emulation with configurable intensity levels and fixes Bluetooth connections that could repeatedly drop, especially on the Steam Deck.
Final thoughts
This update comes with a lot, and I’ve only picked out what stood out most to me. Seeing Big Art Mode, screensavers and the Personal Calendar graduate from the beta is great, but Pyrowave for Remote Play and the second pairing slot for the Steam Controller are the changes I’m most excited about. Let me know in the comments which one stands out to you.