Valve will finally turn off the Steam Deck screen while downloading games

Valve is testing a low-power way to complete downloads on your Steam Deck without having to leave the mobile device turned on with the screen turned on. As part of an update currently on Steam Deck’s Beta and Preview channels, the mobile device can “complete all active downloads in the new low-power viewing mode before entering sleep mode.” Valve says.

I’m glad this change is being implemented; I download a lot of games and updates to my Steam Deck, and have often wished I didn’t have to leave the screen on while doing so. Edge I asked Valve about this a couple of years ago when the Steam Deck OLED launched, and the company seemed to think the Deck was good enough without it.

“We burn a lot of power when downloading,” hardware engineer Yazan Al-Dahiyat said at the time, which suggests to us that players may not want to accidentally leave a hot Steam Deck in their bag if they mistakenly think it’s asleep. Valve’s solution announced today appears to resolve some of these concerns.

With the update installed, when you press the power button while Deck is downloading something, you’ll see a new dialog asking if you want to continue downloading but with the screen turned off. If you choose Continue, your group will enter low power mode. “While in this mode, if you press a button or move the Steam Deck, a new status screen will be displayed as the download progresses,” Valve says. “From here you can activate the entire Steam Deck or allow it to continue downloading with the screen turned off.”

This feature is turned on by default when a Steam Deck device is connected. You can also choose to enable it while running on battery in Settings, though if the Steam Deck’s battery level drops below 20 percent, your device will go into full sleep mode.