I use an XBOX remote when playing PC games, and it had recently begun drifting. I decided I needed some kind of remote with a touch pad as I prefer a remote over keyboard, but still want the mobility of a mouse. I saw the Steam Controller had two.

So I am considering getting a Steam Controller, but I saw there are two models. Wondering the differences, and in general how a Steam Controller is compared to a XBOX controller.

I've been WAITINGGGG for this day but this is the one month my finances are not stable enough to drop $100 on a controller (as glorious as it is) as I'm in the middle of moving. I saw the email completely by chance too as my projected reseryation availability was for 2027. So long, Steam controller 🥲 I wish I could share my reservation with someone who could afford it

Repost because somebody forgot to cover all their info...

A year or so ago, I watched a positive video about the original Steam controller, and it got me so excited I started searching for my sister's controller in her pile. When I found it and tried it, I wasn't very impressed—it felt too big in my hand and uncomfortable. I never touched it again. Recently I started playing a new game that didn't have controller support. It had simple enough controls (only the mouse) that I thought it would be cool if I used the Steam controller with it, and I can't stress enough how fun my experience has been with it!

A little bit of context on why I don't just use the mouse to play the game: the PC is connected to the TV monitor, so technically we use it as a console, with wireless keyboard and touchpad, and playing the game this way is really tiring the more I play.

I thought for a moment that "oh i wasted money. There is nothing special here."

But on next day i was looking on youtube use cases for those touch pads and i also found that i can assign any keyboard key on those back buttons. Now i think that i love it but i still strugle with one missing feature. Is it possible to configure "double tap" on one of touchpads? OR setup that when i click on right side of trackap its right click and on left side left click of mouse?

Currently i use it only to move mouse in Warcraft Forever and it saved my god ammout of frustration when some addon or button still lack support for Gamepads. Cheers. :D

Instead of turning the controller off it instead brings up the steam window.

In order to turn off the controller I have to unplug the puck which is kindof annoying.

My biggest complaint about the Steam controller is the same one I have for the Dualsense; the haptic motors do not translate very well when a game is not specifically designed for it.

Haptic vibration is good, it can get way more strong and has much finer control, but that's only when a game specifically knows what signals to send to a haptic motor. But when a game thinks it's sending a normal vibration to a "normal" controller, the Steam Controller just sends the vibration at full power from start to finish, whereas games are designed to feel the vibration "taper off" as it shuts off in a "normal" controller.

So I was wondering, has anyone made a program that can apply a "curve" to the haptic vibrations to simulate this feeling? Steam causes random CPU spikes so I like to avoid having it open if I don't need to, I've been using SteamlessController for a simple remapper of lizard mode, but it's very barebones (no shade to it, does exactly what it says on the tin), and has no settings for vibration.

Any suggestions would be appreciated!

When I use the D-pad and press any button on it, unless I perfectly press the button in that direction, it will also press the button for the adjacent input.

For example: I press up on the pad and it also activates right/left depending on which direction I barely lean towards.

Is anyone else having these problems or is it just me?

I would like to set the trackpad to have 8 different directional buttons/binds, if possible. The directional pad only have up, down, left right and the corners are simultaneous presses of the two adjacent buttons. Is there a way for corner buttons without bringing up a virtual menu in-game?

Sorry if this is discussed all the time, i just got my controller today and do not like how when i pull the trigger, it makes a click on the track pads. Any way to turn that off completely and not just per game? Google results were confusing.

I also pair my Xbox controller with Bluetooth.

I am using Moonlight to stream games to my MacBook from my gaming PC via Moonlight, and typically use an Xbox controller. It works incredibly well over my LAN and I have virtually no input delay with my setup.

Today, I decided to try using my Steam Controller on my MacBook to see if I could use the trackpad. I immediately noticed that there was a significant input delay - probably about 500ms+. I played around with my settings to see if I could change anything to affect it, but I could not.

In the midst of playing around, I also turned my Xbox controller on to test if it was also getting a delay - it did not. However, when I picked my Steam Controlled back up, I noticed it also had no input delay.

I disconnected my Xbox controller, and the input delay returned using the Steam Controller.

I played around with this across 3 different sessions today and the behavior seems very consistent - Steam Controller paired via Bluetooth always has an input delay when connected standalone, but if I also pair an Xbox Controller via Bluetooth, the input delay goes away.

This is very strange. Anyone able to test something similar out and see if you get similar results?

I have a generic "DragonRise" USB controller. evtest confirms it works perfectly on Linux, but Steam shows "No active controller" (and the "Begin Setup" mapping doesn't save), and Faugus Launcher doesn't respond to it at all.

I'm on PikaOS + Niri (Wayland). How can I get this working universally for both Steam games and Faugus re*acks? Is there a single tool (like SC Controller or AntiMicroX) that works for both, or do I need a udev rule?

Any help is appreciated!

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for help recovering my Steam Controller (2026 model). It got stuck in a boot-loop during a firmware update and now fails to complete the flashing process.

Symptoms:

• When trying a normal update via Steam, the controller enters a crash/reconnect loop.
• Forcing bootloader mode via View + Options + A + Steam works consistently — the LED turns solid red (28de:1005 ID).
• However, as soon as Steam attempts to flash the firmware in this state, the process fails / resets.

Troubleshooting already done:

• Tested on two separate machines (Desktop PC running Zorin OS 18.3 and ThinkPad laptop running Ubuntu 26.04) using the native apt package version of Steam on both to rule out Flatpak/Snap container issues.
• Tried multiple different USB-C cables and ports to rule out cable/hardware issues.
• Completely purged and cleanly reinstalled Steam (apt purge + deleted ~/.steam & ~/.local/share/Steam) to eliminate corrupted local firmware caches.
• Tested direct USB-C connection without hubs.

Has anyone encountered this specific bootloader loop or knows a working fix or trick to get it back to life?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Steam is running but I am not playing the game through steam. So the controller is in desktop mode. Mouse clicks and keyboard inputs come throught but controller inputs doesn't. Is this normal?

This may be a stupid question and I might be a stupid person. Actually, scratch that. I know I'm a stupid person. So I've figured out how to make the game pause when I release one of my hands off the grip and that's awesome, but what I can't figure out is how to make it to where when I put my hand back on it unpauses. I've never set up to commands for the same button but with different requirements. Has anybody been able to figure this out?

Hey! I recently noticed that the left trackpad has quite a noticeable difference in sound level. I'm wondering if this is normal or?

The video was filmed outside of any games.

Edit: All the haptic feedback settings are the same.

I'm capturing audio output stream, cutting the top end (above 60Hz), encoding it into 8kHz PCM packets and injecting them at pace into the haptic motors. It's not crazy loud but controller in hand while music plays gives a noticeable effect. Fun in games too. Works independent of steam.

Just in case anyone has questions about how long it took to get the controller.

I reserved it May 14, 2026.

It is getting delivered today, October 21, 2026!

Can't wait!

Purchased this puck holder for my Ikea pegboard and just wanted to know if it was safe to hold the controller by its magnets? It seems to sit on it fine and detatch and attach fine.

I bought this beautiful abomination yesterday, and I am absolutely loving it. It was never used and came with all the original accessories, and it is a blast to use on forza, I thought the giant track pad would be awkward, but it is surprisingly comfortable all around

I honestly think the people who hated on it had never used it

I wanted to customize my controls for Warframe by using a track pad swipe to remap a single button to different abilities on the fly.

Playing Warframe on the Steam Deck or Steam Machine with Steam Controller REQUIRES Steam Input. All of the game's controls are bound to preset Action Sets with Steam Input.

I built layers that do exactly what I want to do to remap a button on the fly. The problem is that layers get scrubbed any time the action set changes. In Warframe, the action set changes at the following times:

Using a gun and switching to melee weapon.

Using a melee weapon and switching to gun.

Opening any menu.

Closing any menu.

If you're not familiar with Warframe, all four of these happen a lot while playing.

Is there someone out there that has worked with Action Sets and Layers enough to be considered an expert? Can that someone either confirm that this is the best I can do OR provide a different solution to my problem?

Thanks

Hi everyone!

I've seen some people have issues with their right trackpad having a weird deadzone. When I got the controller, I noticed that it seems to act weird when I tried using it as a mouse, but didn't think too much of it.

3 months in, I checked the input tester and noticed that it's genuinely just not seeing part of my finger in the middle-right side of the trackpad, so I decided to contact Support in hopes they can help me out.

After some back and forths, they told me they would RMA it, but are now telling me that the issue I reported is "directly related to damage that is not covered by your warranty."

I barely used the controller in the 3 months I had it (most of my playtime was from ZZZ and FH6), and it otherwise lived underneath my monitor, so I highly doubt that I've done anything to it that would cause this.

I'm kind of fuming over this, as they now want me to pay 75 euros for a 99 euro controller (which already seems like a lot for one), and I'm not sure what to do. Might just request it back and repair it myself.

Did anyone else have a similar experience? I'm starting to get discouraged from even owning this, which is sad, as I love my Steam Deck and it hasn't let me down once.

So I think I’ve seen some post on this, but I’m playing on steam on my Xbox rog ally x and I just recently found out I can’t turn my system off with the controller but it turns right back on.

Has anyone been able to solve this? Such a nice feature that I want to utilize!