Steam Frame: The Ars Technica review
Valve's new $1,049 VR hardware tries to revive an abandoned VR "revolution."
In 2010, Valve was a leader in the burgeoning virtual reality industry. They partnered with HTC to create the Vive headset and developed the SteamVR platform to support it. Later, Valve introduced the Index headset and even produced a proof-of-concept adventure game, Half-Life: Alyx. However, the release of Meta (formerly Oculus) Quest, a more affordable and untethered headset, shifted the market.
The Quest line began to dominate the VR space in the 2020s, leading to Valve's apparent disinterest in their previous VR hardware and software projects. This shift makes the upcoming release of the $1,049 Steam Frame, which began accepting reservations in 2026, quite unexpected. Despite the hype surrounding VR technology not materializing as anticipated, Valve has decided to enter the standalone VR headset market.
After testing the Steam Frame, it feels like a headset that is overly complex and underdeveloped, depending on one's perspective.
Written by urgent.news from Ars Technica's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
