The Steam Deck is perfectly capable of running Windows
There are even official driver packages from Valve
Valve is kind of a unicorn among tech companies, in that they want the user to be able to do whatever they want with their hardware once purchased. That’s why Steam OS is based on Linux, so it can be tweaked to personal preferences. It has a huge community of coders that add functionality without proprietary lock-outs like you find on other operating systems. That permissive nature extends to the ability to change the entire operating system to Windows, with Valve even supplying the necessary driver packages. Currently, only the Steam Deck LCD has full driver support, but Valve says they’re working on supplying Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and Audio drivers for Windows on the Steam Deck OLED as well.
Steam OS is more functional and often faster
You lose more than you gain by switching to Windows
If you install Windows on your Steam Deck instead of Steam OS, you’ll lose access to things like the Quick Settings menu. That handy tool lets you see performance overlays and change settings like Bluetooth. Furthermore, where it truly shines is being able to change the Steam Deck’s APU power settings on the fly. Lowering the wattage, limiting the FPS in-game, and more can all be accomplished with a few taps of the slide-out menu. That’s something you can’t do on the Steam Deck if you install Windows. The Legion Go or ROG Ally have custom software packages for Windows that the respective manufacturers created. The Steam Deck has no such program, and likely never will.
But it’s not only additional features you’ll miss out on if you migrate to Windows. In many cases, you’ll be losing performance as well. While we don’t have direct benchmarks for Windows running on the Steam Deck, I found a video from a YouTube creator called TheTerk. They found that from a selection of 20 games, only four ran faster on Windows than on Steam OS. Of the games that ran better on Steam OS, five had over 10% more frames per second, with one game, God of War, running 22.3% faster on Valve’s OS. That’s a significant amount of performance, although I will caution that 10% at lower than 60FPS is only 6 frames at best, so while it will make games a little smoother, it’s not a huge jump.
Steam OS is still the best choice for the Steam Deck
The tight integration into your Steam Library makes Steam OS the better choice for most users of the Steam Deck. Valve designed the operating system to feel more like a cohesive handheld console, so that it fades into the background and lets gamers enjoy their libraries. That’s a winning formula, as shown by Nintendo, who’s undoubtedly still the handheld console champ for usability. The only scenario that makes sense for running a Windows-powered Steam Deck is if you play a lot of multiplayer games that require anti-cheat software to be installed. But even then, you can get away with dual-booting so you don’t lose the benefits of Steam OS when you play other games.
