Valve has suddenly and dramatically increased the price of its Steam Deck OLED range, pushing the price of the 1TB model beyond even a PS5 Pro.
In fact, the price increases here are staggering: the 512GB model has gone from $549 to $789, while the aforementioned 1TB model has jumped from $649 to $949. Yes, that’s a $300 price increase.
The new pricing is as follows around the world:
Steam Deck 512GB
$789/£649/€779
Steam Deck 1TB
$949/£779/€919
Exactly what this will mean for Valve’s console-like Steam Machine, which is still expected at some point later this year, is unclear.
But it’s already refreshed discussions about whether the PS6 will be viable in 2027, which is when the next-gen hardware is expected to release.
I think it’s worth remembering that Sony has much stronger buying power than Valve, as its consoles are built to sell in the tens of millions.
That gives it an advantage over the Steam maker, as its handheld had shipped about six million units as of 2025. PlayStation will always have the economy of scale advantage here.
But there’s no two ways about it: things are looking dire for the entire consumer electronics sector right now.
This isn’t a case of one company being greedier than another: we’ve seen Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, and now Valve all struck by global economic issues out of their control. I don’t think any of these companies want to be doing this.
There is an argument these wildly profitable organisations could eat into their sizable profit margins to keep prices low, but I just don’t think anyone has the appetite to stomach $100 or $200 losses on hardware right now. And so this is the situation we’re in.
My biggest concern is that even if the PS6 does get delayed, there’s no guarantee the current situation will improve. I’m of the belief that if Sony's planning to get its next-gen console out next Christmas, it may as well do it and hope it can bring prices down later.
But I think at this point we can probably all agree that the sticker shock is going to hit quite hard.
The tech sector has been rocked by spiralling memory prices, led by demand from AI. The economy has also been hit by a variety of different headwinds, including several wars and tariffs.
There is some suggestion Sony may have designed the PS6 with cost cutting in mind, but even if that was its plan when building the console, a lot of its hard work will have been affected by the current economic climate.
I genuinely don’t know where we go from here: there’s still plenty of pent-up demand for video games, but the cost of playing them is quickly becoming unaffordable for many.
