From Steam Deck to Steam Phone: Valve endorses emulation of Windows games on ARM devices

The Steam Deck and Steam Machine run on SteamOS based on Linux, but these devices can still play many Steam games that are actually only available for Windows. This is made possible by Proton, an open-source tool that converts Microsoft’s DirectX graphics API to Vulkan. In practice, this results in minimal performance loss, as illustrated by the Steam Deck. In the future, Valve plans to take an even bigger step.

As Pierre-Loup Griffais, one of the architects of SteamOS, confirmed in an interview with The Verge, Valve is funding several open-source projects that make it possible to play Windows games on ARM-based smartphones. One of these projects is called Fex, which is an emulator that also enables the Steam Frame VR headset to run x86 games on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. By combining Fex and Proton, the gap between Windows and Linux and the divide between x86 and ARM can be bridged.

Since this software is open-source, Valve and the respective developers are laying the groundwork to run Steam games on ARM smartphones, tablets and laptops that do not use Windows. The technology is already available for Android smartphones today via the GameHub app, although it’s not always running smoothly according to our recent hands-on. According to Pierre-Loup Griffais, Valve is not actively developing a native Steam or SteamOS version for Android smartphones. But similar to how CrossOver emulates the Windows version of Steam on macOS and Linux, it is likely only a matter of time before comparable software becomes available for Android.