The first shipping samples of the much-anticipated Steam Deck have finally arrived, and we’ve already brought you our initial impressions. Now, alongside our full review that’s in the works, we’re taking a dive into the hard performance numbers, to see how this device stacks up against existing alternatives. (Also check out our Steam Deck 101 primer.)
Plenty of benchmark results out there show the general capability of the Steam Deck. But where does it fall on the gaming-capability spectrum compared with a general-use laptop twice its price, or a with budget-priced gaming laptop? Is the Steam Deck a solid alternative to spending more than $1,000 for playable PC-gaming performance?
To answer these questions, we’ve run a series of in-game benchmark tests using a host of real-world titles, and pitted those results against our existing testing data from our many laptop benchmarks. Below is a rundown of how we structured the tests, within the confines of obstacles unique to the Steam Deck. This background is worth reading, as you’ll learn a bunch about how the Steam Deck handles games you’re used to playing on PCs. (Spoiler: not all the same!)
Testing the Steam Deck: Solving for Some Unique Challenges
Testing the Steam Deck is certainly more complicated than running simple game benchmarks on a run-of-the-mill laptop. The device, in theory, can play games from your Steam Library, but not all titles are equally compatible with the Deck. Valve has employed a rating system, replete with tiers and badges, to indicate how well suited games are to play on the device.
A handful of games are currently rated as “Verified” to function fully on Valve’s device, with another batch falling into a tier dubbed “Playable.” The latter will play but may experience some minor input or graphics issues, or need modification to work fully.
Beyond that is the “Unsupported” tier, in which a game won’t play at all. And then you have games currently categorized as “Unknown.” This class comprises many, many games that have yet to be tested or rated with one of the other badges. Plenty of them could end up being at least playable, while many won’t work at all.
All of this is to say that we have fewer options to work with than usual for testing, especially if we then want to cross-reference that list with games we have existing test results for, and games that have repeatable built-in benchmark utilities. This being the Steam Deck, Ubisoft’s titles are not currently compatible, for instance, leaving out the popular Assassin’s Creed Valhalla and Rainbow Six Siege, two games for which we have a whole bank of reference results.
Then there’s the consideration of the display resolution. On the Steam Deck, our tests were run once on the device’s display at its native 16:10 resolution (1,280 by 800 pixels), and once at 1080p (1,920 by 1,080) to an external monitor. (The Steam Deck can output a higher-than-native signal via its USB-C port.) You’ll see 720p screens much more often than what is technically an 800p display here, so you may see the term “720p” floating around in relation to the Steam Deck. But know that the built-in screen is slightly higher than 720p at its native resolution.
Obviously, many Steam Deck owners will only ever play on the device’s built-in screen. Some may never connect it to an external monitor or TV at all, so the 800p numbers will be their chief interest, even if they wouldn’t run games at that or an equivalent resolution (like 720p) on a laptop. Still, plenty of users will at least try a second screen, and that makes it possible to compare our 1080p Steam Deck numbers directly to those of a handful of representative laptops.
To run those Steam Deck tests at 1080p, we connected the Deck to an external display via its USB-C port. However, when we connected games to an external display in this mode, the games would not run at 1080p. The menus would adapt properly to the new screen and show up on the external monitor just fine, but when we launched a game, it would launch at 800p, as if it were still running on the built-in screen. Every one of these games would not offer the option to change resolution to 1080p; just the native resolution showed up, even though it was actively displaying on the 1080p external screen.
To get around this, we ran the 1080p tests with the Steam Deck in desktop mode. If you’re unsure what that means, let us explain.
What’s Desktop Mode?
Several different software layers make the Steam Deck tick. On a core level, the device is based on Arch Linux, and Valve used this to create two different modes in which you can use the Steam Deck. By default, the Steam Deck launches into SteamOS 3.0, a simple custom skin that uses elements of Steam’s Big Picture Mode to provide a clean, accessible version of your Steam library. You could use the device this way exclusively, if you’d like, very similar to a Nintendo Switch.
Alternatively, you can launch the device in desktop mode. This lets you run the Steam Deck as a Linux PC (specifically, a fairly stock KDE Plasma) complete with access to a real desktop and the familiar desktop Steam application. You can view your library, change system settings, download, and launch titles from here.
With the native display, desktop mode works great, provided the title is Steam Deck-verified. Some Playable titles forced the use of the touch screen on their launcher, which was awkward. Behind the scenes, a Proton emulation layer allows the Steam Deck to run Windows titles on Linux. This (and the ability to play emulated games) will be covered in more detail in our full review of the Steam Deck.
In desktop mode, when we set the desktop resolution to 1080p on the external screen, games launched properly and ran at 1080p, solving the issue. That said, despite Arch Linux powering both modes, we did notice titles performed differently in SteamOS and in desktop mode. It wasn’t always worse in SteamOS or desktop mode, either; some titles ran better in one, and some better in the other. For consistency of comparison, we ran the 800p tests with the built-in display in desktop mode too.
As far as components, the Steam Deck features a four-core, eight-thread AMD CPU with a 2.4GHz clock speed that can boost up to 3.5GHz. It’s based on AMD’s Zen 2 architecture (not the chip maker’s latest platform), and Valve has stated that it’s roughly equivalent to an AMD Ryzen 3750 CPU that can be found in some mini-PCs. The GPU, meanwhile, is based on AMD’s newer RDNA 2 architecture. It runs eight cores and clocks up to 1.6GHz.
The Test Games: Big-Budget Action, and Some Stressful Sims
In spite of these hurdles, we were able to run quite a few comparative benchmarks. Let’s run down which games we tested.
AAA titles are big-budget first- and third-person games with single-player or cooperative story campaigns. They often prioritize high-fidelity visuals and cutting-edge tech (including detailed models, textures, and realistic animations and effects), and are usually developed by some of the biggest studios in the industry. For this story, our AAA games are Borderlands 3 and Red Dead Redemption 2.
Strategy and simulation titles seem to play nicely with Steam Deck, though finding an ideal input solution will be a little more difficult. (Most aren’t designed with joysticks and trigger buttons in mind.) We tested here with Civilization VI, Total War: Warhammer 2, F1 2020, and F1 2021 in this category. These games can lean heavily on the CPU, but Civilization VI has a graphics-focused benchmark, Warhammer 2 includes a battle benchmark (which renders many more units in real time than the game’s turn-based campaign map), and the F1 titles feature fast-moving, shiny 3D visuals.
We have a bank of results for these games, thanks to a recent analysis we did of laptop integrated graphics, some additional testing, and the F1 2021 results we have from our many gaming-laptop reviews. We tested these games on the Steam Deck in accordance with the existing data, running chiefly at low and medium graphical detail presets. This worked for the laptops in our test set with integrated graphics, and it’s a good fit for the Steam Deck. F1 2021 is run at higher settings, since it is used to test the effect of DLSS or FSR. The Steam Deck’s GPU is from AMD, leaving out the Nvidia-exclusive DLSS as an option, but AMD’s FSR is a functional stand-in.
The systems we are using here for comparison were chosen to illustrate three very common laptop-graphics scenarios. Two of the laptops rely on CPU-integrated graphics, and we selected representative Intel and AMD variants for our comparison. The Samsung Galaxy Book Pro 360 makes use of Intel Iris Xe Graphics, the latest rev of Intel’s integrated silicon. The Iris Xe silicon, in our test model, was part of a very common CPU among mainstream laptops: the Intel Core i7-1165G7. The HP Envy x360 15 (2021), meanwhile, is equipped with integrated AMD Radeon Graphics (the Vega 8 variety) on an AMD Ryzen 7 5700U mobile CPU.
We also plugged in an Acer laptop, the Nitro 5. Like the others, this is a 15-inch-class laptop, but this is a gaming laptop just received in PC Labs and equipped with GeForce RTX 3050 Ti dedicated graphics. We’d expect it to well outperform any handheld, but given that this machine runs a little more than $1,000, it represents the kind of experience you’d get from a low-end gaming laptop.
We’ve divided up the comparisons as they make sense, comparing 1080p results head-to-head while also showing off the Steam Deck’s native 800p numbers so you can get a sense of how it’s capable of running on its own screen. Is it better than integrated graphics? How close does it get to Nvidia’s lower-end laptop gaming graphics? Let’s find out!
The Results: Practical Performance
Given the range of Intel integrated graphics (the Samsung Galaxy Book Pro 360), AMD integrated graphics, and a true (but still entry-level) gaming-ready laptop GPU in the Acer Nitro 5, these scores will range widely. Again, in the charts you’ll find the 800p Steam Deck results when tested with its built-in display, its 1080p results run on an external monitor, and the laptops at 1080p.
Be sure to click or tap around within our charts below, to switch between games, or filter by settings, too. Without further ado, let’s look at the two AAA Steam titles.
I was happy to discover that Red Dead Redemption 2, specifically, was playable and performed pretty well on the Steam Deck. This type of open AAA title may be just the type that you’d expect either to not be compatible with the device, or to run quite poorly. Instead, its performance at the Steam Deck’s native 800p resolution is comfortable (if shy of 60 frames per second), and maintaining a frame rate above 30fps at 1080p is better than I expected. Borderlands 3 is a similar story, just with a higher average frame rate, nearly approaching 60fps on the lowest settings.
These results may not blow you away, but it was easy for expectations to be overly high for the Steam Deck. You need to consider the handheld nature of this device, the size, and the cost, and dial in what’s reasonable to expect. The Steam Deck is still half the price of these laptops with integrated graphics and outperforms them handily—they were scarcely able to hit 30fps on the lowest settings at 1080p. Considering the device can also act as a (diminished) PC, it’s not a bad value.
On a raw performance basis, it’s no surprise that a gaming laptop, even a cheaper one like the Nitro 5, is clearly the way to go. But gaming laptops have been around for plenty long—if you wanted one, or wanted to spend $1,000 to play some Steam games, you would have one. The Steam Deck performs a unique role, and while I also hoped for 60fps somehow, it’s not something you should expect out of a device this size when big, stationary consoles have only recently gotten to that point.
I should restate the pricing: More bluntly, the least-storage-equipped Steam Deck is $399, while the Nitro 5 costs $1,099, and it isn’t anything close to a handheld! Getting roughly base PlayStation 4-grade performance out of this handheld is nothing to sneeze at, ultimately. We’re not trying to excuse or justify the frame rates—it’s okay to be a touch disappointed if you hoped for more—but just need to hammer home the context here.
Of course, this Linux system is ready for the kinds of PC titles you don’t usually associate with consoles, like simulations and strategy games. Now, putting aside the issue of how reasonable it is to actually play these types of games with a connected mouse or the touchpads, let’s see if they’ll even run…
These results are, frankly, pretty good. On most of these games, the Nitro 5 gaming laptop again leaves the rest in the dust, but we’ve established that by now. In an interesting twist, though, the integrated graphics laptops are much closer, particularly on Civilization VI. Since it’s not the most visually intensive game, and requires a lot of calculations, we can assume it’s a more CPU-bound test, giving these snappy laptops a chance to compete outside of raw graphics power.
The Steam Deck is plenty capable of running the strategy games, plus the slower pace of Civilization in particular diminishes any input awkwardness. The frame rates for Warhammer II are much more palatable at the native resolution—if you try to play at 1080p, your battles will probably be a little choppy. Still, in either mode you have the option of using a mouse and simulating battles rather than playing them out yourself. The frame rates at 800p are solid.
The F1 racing games are also interesting—the Steam Deck simply flies at the low and medium settings in F1 2020, coasting over 60fps at both resolutions. This type of game is well suited to the device, too, so this is a nice win. It’s a well-optimized title, as indicated by how well the integrated-graphics laptops performed, too, but the Steam Deck still has a notable leg up.
Our F1 2021 testing run was done at much more demanding settings. Note a few different laptops in this chart: Our banked data for this title is from our gaming-laptop reviews, used to test the impact of DLSS on or off (or as mentioned in this case, FSR) at the highest setting, so that’s how we used it to test the Steam Deck too. The frame rates aren’t great here, though you’ll note how even the Nitro 5 struggled relative to the other games.
FSR slightly improved the frame rate, but only just. The Steam Deck does technically average 30fps at native resolution, but it’s tight. Superior GPUs in the other gaming laptops soared in comparison, but even the RTX 3060 in the MSI Katana machine scarcely maintained 60fps on these settings, so you can forgive the Steam Deck somewhat.
In short, there are two useful takeaways from this game: Don’t expect FSR to work magic, and playing modern 3D games at maximum visual settings, like this one, on the Steam Deck may be a challenge.
Within Realistic Expectations, the Steam Deck Delivers
Overall, we’d say the Steam Deck both performs admirably and falls roughly where it should in the graphics hierarchy. You’re getting notably better performance than you will get from the integrated graphics found in general-use laptops that cost twice the price, while dedicated gaming systems, even the cheapest ones, easily outpace the performance.
You’ll have to pay up for even the most basic gaming laptop with a GeForce chip; the very cheapest start at round $750 to $800, and supplies these days are tight. And in either case, the form factor of a typical gaming laptop is not nearly as unique or appealing as it is with Valve’s device, which also doesn’t see its performance drop when off the charger, as happens with gaming laptops.
Now, mind you, the Steam Deck is not defying thermodynamics. But it does succeed as a capable handheld PC gaming device for your Steam games in a broad sense, and in some areas is better than you may think. It also makes a strong case when you look at cost-to-performance, even without the fact that it’s much less cumbersome to play on your couch, in bed, or in transit than a laptop could ever be.
We hope these numbers provide insight into what types of games run well on the Steam Deck, and if it’s worth it for you to buy instead of a laptop. For our full judgements on all facets of its design, usability, and feature set, be sure to read our full Steam Deck review.
