Steam Frame Release Date, Price, Specs, And Everything We Know About Valve’s Next-Gen VR Headset

It’s been years since Valve first launched its in-house VR headset, the Valve Index, back in 2019, but the Steam owner has spent the time well developing its new Steam Frame. This standalone headset brings modern technological standards to Valve’s VR efforts, including inside-out tracking, improved streaming support, on-board processing, and even Android compatibility.

There’s so much going on with the Steam Frame that simply calling it a next-generation device seems like underselling it, as Valve attempts to thread the needle of top-in-class specifications while also offering a product more attainable than other headsets from the likes of Apple, Meta, and Samsung.

We’re rounding up everything we know about the Steam Frame following Valve’s announcement, including its release window, full specifications, usage modes, controllers, and, of course, pricing. Check back in for more as we continue to update this post with any new information that Valve divulges leading up to the Steam Frame’s release in early 2026. You should also check out everything we know about the Steam Machine in case you’re planning to pick up the pair of hardware offerings from Valve in the near future.

Steam Frame Release Date

The Steam Frame will be released in Q1 2026. Like Valve’s new Steam Machine and Steam Controller, the Steam Frame doesn’t yet have a firm release date. Instead, Valve promises that the new VR headset is primed to launch in early 2026, with further clarification from the company constraining that to Q1 2026. That means you should expect the Steam Frame to launch sometime before March 31, 2026. Like the Steam Deck before it, Valve plans to distribute the Steam Frame through Steam itself in the same regions that are currently supported, with some third-party retailers supporting other regions. Basically, if you can order a Steam Deck, you’ll be able to order a Steam Frame, with Valve stating that it plans to expand its distribution over time.

Steam Frame Price

Like the rest of its hardware announcements, Valve fell short of specifying a price for the Steam Frame. Unlike its previous Index headset, the Steam Frame is a standalone headset with onboard processing, which will affect its eventual price. Similarly, a lot of the hardware used in VR headsets has become cheaper over time, so it’s not as easy to predict a price when looking back at the Valve Index’s $1000 asking price.

Looking at the specifications, it’s clear that the Steam Frame is an advanced VR headset, and that will likely be reflected in the cost. But there are also concessions made that might keep costs down, like the inclusion of LCD displays over OLED, or monochromatic front-facing cameras over full color ones. Until Valve announces a price, however, all we can do is speculate.

Steam Frame Specifications

Unlike Valve’s previous VR headsets, the Steam Frame is a standalone headset. This means that it features onboard processing, by way of a very capable Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 ARM64 chip that you would otherwise find in flagship Android smartphones. This means two things. One, the Steam Frame runs SteamOS natively, with Valve working hard to get it running on ARM for the first time and allowing for translation to the Linux operating system similar to how Proton does the same for x86 applications, which means that you can run games natively on it. Secondly, this means that the Steam Frame can run Android apps, something which Valve says is fully supported. Combined with 16GB of unified LPDDR5X RAM, the Steam Frame is a powerful device in its own right, with Valve attempting to showcase this by having Half-Life: Alyx run on it natively.

Native gameplay is just one way Valve expects you to play with the Steam Frame. Included with each headset is a dongle for streaming, letting you beam over gameplay from a nearby PC to enjoy on the Steam Frame, be it native VR titles or traditional ones you want to play on a larger screen within the headset. The dongle produces a strong 6GHz connection with the Steam Frame, with the headset itself featuring two antennas to better manage the data coming in. One is primarily for streaming in video and audio data, while the other handles your standard network connection. This improves streaming performance at higher bitrates, improving the stability and visual quality of the games you’re streaming over previous solutions offered by Valve and competitors.

The Steam Frame comes equipped with two 2160×2160 PCD displays (per eye), utilizing a custom pancake lens that affords a wide 110-degree field of view. Interpupillary Distance, or IPD, is managed with a simple wheel on top of the device and can be locked in with a button near the bottom, with a provided spacer also allowing you to use the Steam Frame with glasses (Valve says it will aim to offer prescription lenses sometime after launch). Two speakers for each ear can be found on each side of the headstrap, while the repositioning of the battery to the back of the headstrap helps counterbalance the entire headset for better comfort during longer sessions. The headset alone is just 185g, while the entire thing will weigh closer to 440g when used with the provided headstrap.

While the Valve Index made great use of external cameras to track controller and body movements accurately, the Steam Frame instead uses inside-out tracking like most of its competitors. The headset features four outward facing monochrome cameras, each of which have IR illuminators for better tracking and passthrough support in the dark. Passthrough is, similarly, monochromatic, and can be activated at any time. Valve provides expansion ports on the front of the headset for users that want to add additional peripherals or cameras in the future.

While there are numerous cameras for outward tracking, there are two additional ones inside the headset for pupil tracking. These low-latency cameras track where you’re looking at all times, which it then uses to power what Valve calls foveated streaming. Similar to a solution found in Sony’s PlayStation VR 2, the Steam Frame can dynamically improve visual clarity depending on where you’re looking, which can feed streaming resources into the areas that are actually observed as opposed to ones in the periphery. Valve says this can improve visual detail by almost 10x, and works automatically for all games on Steam since it’s happening at a hardware level on the Steam Frame.

You can find the full specifications for the Steam Frame below.

The controllers that ship with the Steam Frame will be very familiar if you’ve used any other VR headset in the past five years, but for good reason. Their shape and size aid in accurate tracking while giving your handles ample space to grip and reach all included buttons. The inputs aren’t stripped back, either, featuring everything you’ll need to play all VR and traditional games within the Steam Frame without having to opt for a more traditional gamepad. It also doesn’t lose functionality from the previous Valve Index controllers, retaining capacitive finger tracking (and similar knuckle straps that let you use the controller without outright gripping it) as well as AA battery support for up to 40 hours of life per charge. Like the new Steam Controller, the Steam Frame controller will feature magnetic TMR thumbsticks that offer a greater lifespan over traditional, and even hall effect, thumbsticks.

You can find the specifications for the Steam Frame controller below.