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Steam's beta overhauls Remote Play HDR and brings it back to Deck OLED

OFFICIAL Written by GPN · Nov 1, 2026, 8:51 PM ET · Steam · Tech

Valve has shipped a new Steam Client build to its Preview and Beta channels, and the headline change is a major rework of how Remote Play handles HDR. Instead of a single on-or-off approach, players now get an advanced HDR setting with three choices, giving them far more control over how streamed games look on the receiving device.

The new options are Automatic, On, and Off. Automatic switches HDR on when HDR content is active, On keeps it enabled at all times and can brighten standard dynamic range content as well, and Off disables it entirely. For players who stream regularly, that middle setting in particular changes the feel of a session, since it is no longer a case of HDR or nothing.

The update also widens where HDR capture works. Beyond games and the Windows desktop, which were already covered, HDR capture is now supported when using PipeWire on desktop Linux and when streaming from macOS. That brings more host setups into the same HDR streaming picture, rather than leaving those platforms behind.

There is good news for handheld players too. HDR is switched back on for Steam Deck OLED in this beta, restoring a feature that had previously been unavailable there. On the phone side, HDR is enabled for Android devices running Android 15 or newer, provided players are using the beta version of the Steam Link app.

As with any beta build, this is a preview release rather than the finished stable update, so players who opt in are testing the new HDR behaviour ahead of a wider rollout. For anyone who streams from a PC to a Deck, a phone, or another screen, though, the rework is a meaningful quality-of-life shift: more settings, more platforms, and a clearer path to a brighter, more consistent streamed image.

Facts gathered from

• Steam News (Valve)

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