Steam Deck Finally Introduces New Quality-of-Life Feature Players Have Been Asking For

The Steam Deck has rolled out a much-wanted new feature that finally allows players to download games with the handheld PC system in low-power mode.

Up until now, you couldn’t download anything without the screen remaining on, but now Valve is enabling Steam Deck to “complete all active downloads in a new display-off low-power mode, before going to sleep.” It will be enabled by default once you’re plugged in, but can also be enabled if you go to Settings > Power when running on battery, too.

“Display-off downloads are accessible in two ways,” Valve explained. “While Steam Deck is downloading content, pressing the power button now brings up a new dialog, asking whether you’d like to continue downloading with the screen off. Select Continue, and Steam Deck will go into the new low-power download mode. In addition, Steam Deck will automatically go into this mode after an idle timeout.”

If you’re in this mode and press a button or move the Deck, a new status screen will be displayed that shows you your download progress. From here, you can choose to fully wake the device or let it finish in low-power mode.

Right now only users in the Beta and Preview channels will have access to the feature, but it shouldn’t be too long before it rolls out for all.

We thought Steam Deck OLED was amazing when it debuted in 2024, writing in our review: “The Steam Deck OLED brings a fantastic, vibrant screen to Valve’s handheld gaming PC, but its most impressive upgrade is the much-improved battery life. Combined with all its other small but altogether significant improvements, not to mention more storage at the same price, and it’s enough to tempt even current Steam Deck owners into upgrading.”

Valve might have kicked off the whole portable PC craze with the Steam Deck, but these days it’s far from the only game in town. Handheld rigs are popping up everywhere, and the competition is getting spicy. Here’s IGN’s picks for the best handheld gaming PCs to take on the go.

Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world’s biggest gaming sites and publications. She’s also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.