A Steam Deck that launched at $400 in 2022 now costs nearly $800 to buy new, after Valve raised prices on both OLED models by $240 to $300 citing "rising memory and storage costs." The 512GB OLED Steam Deck jumped from $549 to $789, while the 1TB model went from $649 to $949, as first spotted by Wario64. Valve confirmed the increases Wednesday in a brief announcement, with the handheld now back in stock after three months of unavailability.
"Steam Deck itself hasn't changed," Valve said. "These new prices reflect the current state of component costs and other global logistical challenges across the industry as a whole." The culprit is the ongoing global memory shortage dubbed "RAMageddon," driven largely by AI hyperscalers scrambling to build data centers. That component crunch has already pushed Sony's PS5 Pro to $900 and Nintendo's Switch 2 to $500, with Lenovo hiking the Legion Go 2 by hundreds of dollars in April.
What makes the Steam Deck increase especially jarring: the hardware is now more expensive years after launch, a trend CNET notes is unprecedented in gaming history. The 1TB OLED model costs more than a PS5 Pro. And the original 256GB LCD Steam Deck, which launched at $399 and has been out of stock for months, is no longer listed for sale.
Valve is still selling refurbished LCD models starting at $359 for a 512GB unit. Refurbished OLED units have also gone up, now priced at $629 for the 512GB and $759 for the 1TB versions. The price hike casts a long shadow over Valve's upcoming hardware. The company originally planned to launch the Steam Machine and Steam Frame VR headset in early 2026 but delayed both due to the same memory and storage shortages.
Valve did manage to ship the Steam Controller on May 4, but the Steam Machine -- a more powerful console-like PC -- was initially speculated to land around $600 to $700. Those estimates no longer hold.
If the Steam Deck's $240 to $300 price jump is any indicator, the Steam Machine is likely looking at a four-figure price tag when it ships later this year.
