Valve Reveals Steam Machine Pricing: It Starts at $1,049

After a long and bumpy road, Valve has finally put a price on the Steam Machine, and it's a lot more than most people were bracing for. The compact, cube-shaped PC was originally expected to launch earlier this year, but a global component shortage forced Valve to delay it to mid-2026. Now, after months of waiting, the Steam Machine is set to arrive before the end of June. The catch is the number attached to it: the entry model starts at $1,049, well above the friendly price point many had hoped for.

Reservations are now open on the official Steam Machine website, with four configurations to choose from. Pricing splits across the four: the 512GB model is $1,049, or $1,128 bundled with the new Steam Controller; the 2TB model is $1,349, or $1,428 with the controller. The 2TB versions also ship with two extra magnetic front plates (one in red fabric and one in solid walnut), a small nod to the customization Valve is building into the hardware. International pricing lands in roughly the same tier, with the 512GB model going for £879 in the UK, €1,039 across the EU, and AU$1,609 in Australia, all inclusive of VAT where it applies.

Buyers will start receiving their units from June 30, though Valve hasn't committed to exactly when each order will land. Anyone who wants one needs to join the reservation list before June 25 at 1:00 PM ET. After that, the list closes, the order of reservations is shuffled at random, and users get an email telling them where they stand. The first wave of purchase emails goes out the week of June 29, and Valve expects to keep sending them throughout the rest of the year.

Valve admits the price is too high

To its credit, Valve isn't dodging the elephant in the room. In comments to Eurogamer, the company conceded the price is "significantly more" than it originally intended. "Our original goal for the price of Steam Machine is no longer viable," said engineer Yazan Aldehayyat. Valve's explanation is one the entire hardware industry has been living through: when it began sourcing components back in 2023, it expected PC part prices to fall over time, as they historically have. Instead, the cost of RAM and storage spiked rapidly over the past year, and the prices announced today reflect what Valve has actually been paying for components over the last six months.

That same crunch is going to affect how many units exist at all. Valve has confirmed that the ongoing RAM supply crisis will keep stock levels lower than originally planned: there were even stretches, the company says, where it simply couldn't acquire certain components at any price. The hope now is that the Steam Machine becomes more affordable down the line, and that the limited launch stock actually reaches real players rather than scalpers.

A reservation lottery to keep out the bots

The random reservation system is a direct response to a lesson Valve learned the hard way. The company admits it underestimated demand when it recently launched the new Steam Controller, and it wants a fairer, less frustrating process this time. A fixed launch time, as Valve puts it, rewards bots, fast internet connections, trained refresh-button fingers, and people who can drop everything at a specific moment. By accepting sign-ups over several days with no advantage for being early, it hopes to remove that pressure, while also giving itself time to validate entries and enforce a limit of one per household.

There are a few eligibility rules: you need a Steam account in good standing and must have made a purchase on Steam before April 27, 2026. Sign-ups are split into three regional lists (North America, UK plus the EU, and Australia), and you can enter for more than one model, with any successful reservation automatically allocated to the most premium model you qualified for. If you land a reservation, you'll have 72 hours to complete the purchase once the email arrives before it passes to the next person in line. (In Japan, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, sales run through Valve's distributor Komodo; the Steam Machine won't be sold in South Korea.)

Not a console, says Valve

One question Valve preempted is whether the Steam Machine is its answer to the PlayStation and Xbox. The company is adamant that it isn't: it considers the Steam Machine "an extension of the world of PC gaming, not a console." The traditional console model, Valve argues, sells hardware below cost and recoups the difference through subscriptions or platform-locked games. That can make sense for a single company in the short term, but Valve maintains that open ecosystems serve players better in the long run, and points to the history of PC gaming as proof that openness has driven hardware and software innovation for decades.

That philosophy comes with a practical upside. If you can't snag a Steam Machine, you aren't locked out of the experience. With the newly released SteamOS 3.8, you can run the same operating system the Steam Machine uses on your own living-room PC, built from whatever components you like, though for now SteamOS only supports AMD graphics cards, with broader compatibility planned. It's a reminder that, pricey as this particular box is, Valve sees it as just one option in a much wider open ecosystem. Reservations close on June 25 and the first units ship June 30, so the market, not the pundits, will settle whether $1,049 is a price PC players are willing to pay. Source: Valve's official Steam Hardware announcement and reservation FAQ.