It's been nearly two years since the Steam Deck's introduction. But with the recent launch of ASUS' ROG Ally handheld, many gamers are asking when Valve will debut a more powerful Steam Deck. Well, a second-gen Steam Deck is in the works, and it should offer a "leap" in performance without a reduced battery life. It just won't be here anytime soon.
In conversations with The Verge and CNBC, Valve’s Pierre-Loup Griffais explains that "changing the performance level" of Steam Deck "is not something we are taking lightly." One of the Deck's strengths is its "fixed performance target;" if a game is optimized for Steam Deck, it will work on every Steam Deck. When an upgraded Steam Deck finally arrives, it will break this "fixed performance target," so the upgrade must be justified by a "significant" increase in processing power.
It’s important to us that the Deck offers a fixed performance target for developers, and that the message to customers is simple, where every Deck can play the same games. As such, changing the performance level is not something we are taking lightly, and we only want to do so when there is a significant enough increase to be had. - Pierre-Loup Griffais
Pierre-Loup Griffais is also concerned about power efficiency. Mobile processors haven't changed too much since the Steam Deck's February 2022 launch, and any improvements that could be made today would reduce the handheld's battery life. If you need proof, just look at the ASUS ROG Ally. It's more powerful than the Steam Deck, but its battery life is downright terrible.
Valve believes that a "leap" in performance will take more than just "a couple of years." A second-gen Steam Deck is off the cards until 2024 at the earliest. But, realistically, we may need to wait until 2025 or 2026.
Thankfully, the Steam Deck is still a very capable device. It can play a ton of AAA games, run emulators, or stand in for a real PC (when it's docked). My only concern is that the Steam Deck will fall behind. New games like "Starfield" already push the Deck to its limits — as games grow more demanding in 2024 and 2025, will the Steam Deck be able to keep up with competing handheld PCs?