If you visit the Steam Deck subreddit right now, you’ll notice a frenzy of frustration and confusion from customers regarding when their new Linux and AMD Zen 2-powered console is shipping. That’s because as Valve promised, the expected availability window is starting to get more specific as Steam Deck production ramps up. But frantically refreshing your order page on the Steam Store might bring bittersweet news.
I previously reported on Valve’s goal to significantly increase the amount of Steam Deck units being produced, following Valve UX designer Lawrence Yang’s statement that by March 2022 “we’ll be in the tens of thousands, by the second month [April 2022] we’ll be in the hundreds of thousands.”
Crucially, Yang pledged that Valve’s vague availability estimate for the vast majority of customers — “Q2” or “After Q3” — would get more granular as the company gained a clearer picture of its production capacity.
That picture is coming into focus now, and depending on your point of view, it may represent reassuring news. Or very disappointing news.
Welcome To The Q3 Gang?
Reports are coming in from all corners that many Steam Deck reservation pages have had their order availability windows changed. If you weren’t lucky enough to snag one extremely quickly on July 16, 2021 when reservations first launched at 10am Pacific Time, you were likely lumped into the “After Q2” group.
Some of those “After Q2” windows have now updated to “Q3 2022,” and I’ve seen some sadness about this. But keep in mind that due to Valve’s relative silence on the matter, “After Q2” could easily have represented any time from July 1, 2022 to some random day in 2026!
So, those of you who prefer to look on the bright side may interpret this as good news. It’s highly likely this an improvement.
But my condolences go out to the folks who’ve seen their “After Q2” window update to “After Q3 2022.” It’s a bit more granular, but still frustrating. This group, however, likely consists of people who reserved a Steam Deck several months after reservations first became possible on July 16, 2021.
One Redditor, for example, reserved theirs the same day I did (photo above, July 16) and their expected availability has changed to Q3 2022. I plunked down my deposit exactly 36 minutes after reservations opened, and mine still sits at Q2 2022. It’s entirely possible that mere minutes separated these transactions.
By contrast, people who reserved in September 2021 are seeing their estimates change to “After Q3 2022.” That’s a very long wait when framed against the enormous hype this system seems to be generating.
Hopefully any speculation or “guestimation” of dates and times and availability estimates will end up being moot, as Valve continues to increase production into the “hundreds of thousands” by next month, with the expectation that it will continue ramping up supply throughout the year.
And bear in mind that your estimated window might continue to fluctuate, so keep an eye on it, and definitely set up some email filters so that when that magic email from Valve arrives, it floats right to the top of your inbox in big bold letters.
