Steam Machine Leak Reveals $1000+ Price

The Steam Machine price may have leaked, and if the leak is accurate, Valve is going to charge at least $1000, if not more. The Steam Machine has been pitched as essentially a console for the living room, aimed to compete with the likes of PS5 and Xbox Series X, or at least this is the expectation of everyone. That said, it sounds like this is not what Valve is aiming for if it’s going to charge considerably more than what Sony and Microsoft are currently charging, granted, for older machines.

The new report comes the way of Jez Corden, who is primarily known for his scoops on Xbox, but who occasionally has scoops that eclipse the realm of Xbox. And according to Corden, he heard last year, when the console was announced in November, that Valve was preparing to charge $1000 for the console, which was originally scheduled to release in the first quarter of 2026. Then the console was delayed, and it was delayed because Valve said it needed more time to calculate the price and more. What happened between November and February when this second announcement was made? Well, the AI scramble caused microchip prices to skyrocket, and the war in Iran squeezed the global economy. Since then, both of these things have only gotten worse. All of this is to say, if Valve was thinking about charging $1000 in November, it’s presumably set to charge even more now. The question will be, how much more? At over $1000, there is no more sweet spot. $1100 is $400 cheaper than $1500, but optically, they may as well be the same. Suffice to say, Valve is in a pickle because it has to release a new machine in one of the worst times to release a gaming machine — if not the worst time ever — in the history of the industry.

Steam Machine DOA?

“I’ll be honest with you…. I heard, last year when it was first announced, it was gonna be $1000.. from a very, very good source, like a very good source,” said Corden.

We recently reported that Valve fans were “scared” to find out the price of the machine, and that was before this report seemingly confirmed their worst suspicions, which is that many of them will be priced at of the Steam Machine when it launches, and that it’s almost certainly going to be DOA. The good news is Valve fans won’t have to wait in this fearful anticipation for much longer, because not only should an announcement be imminent, but a release soon. In the meantime, remember to take everything here with a grain of salt.

For what it is worth, though, Valve fans will probably be lucky to get the Steam Machine for $1000 at this point, especially following Valve’s massive price increase of the Steam Deck this week.

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All of that said, and as always, feel free to leave a comment or two letting us know what you think, or join the video game conversations happening over on the ComicBook Forum.