Two years ago, Valve announced the Steam Deck, a handheld PC gaming console which many declared to be a rival to the Nintendo Switch.

Now, more than a year after the Steam Deck’s official launch in February 2022, Valve has announced the Steam Deck OLED. As you could probably guess, this version of the Steam Deck sports an OLED display for better graphics, as well as increased battery life and other enhanced features.

Steam Deck OLED

All the things you love about Steam Deck, now with an OLED screen, better battery life, faster Wi-Fi, and more.

• Brighter Colors, Blacker Blacks – Steam Deck’s HDR OLED display is designed from the ground up for gaming, with striking contrast, brilliant clarity, and a larger picture. With more colors, pure blacks, and amazing motion rendition, you’ll see your games in a new light.
• More Time to Play – Steam Deck OLED has 30 to 50 percent more battery life. We fit a bigger battery into the case, and the OLED display draws less power. Add in an updated, more efficient AMD APU and you have way more time to play your favorites.
• Faster Downloads – Steam Deck OLED comes with Wi-Fi 6E, offering increased bandwidth and lower latency. This means faster downloads (up to three times faster!) and stable online play.
• Lighter, Cooler – Thanks to a bigger fan and updated thermals, Steam Deck OLED runs cooler. It weighs 30g, or approximately five percent lighter than the LCD model, due to the screen.

If this sounds familiar, it’s probably because the Switch also has its own OLED edition, which was released just a few months after the Steam Deck’s announcement back in 2021. The reveal of the Steam Deck OLED is likely to spawn even more jokes and comparisons between the two consoles.

Oddly enough, in an interview with Eurogamer, Valve hardware engineer Yazan Aldehayyat said that they hoped to include “even more performance” in the upgraded Steam Deck, but this would have to be saved for a “Steam Deck 2.0” as “the technology doesn’t exist yet”.

“Obviously we’d love to get even more performance in the same power envelope, but that technology doesn’t exist yet. That’s what I think we’d call a Steam Deck 2.0.”

With rumors circulating about a possible successor to Nintendo’s Switch coming soon, perhaps that’s the cue Valve is waiting for before putting together their own Steam Deck successor.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.