The State of Linux Gaming - Mid-2023 Edition

In my previous "State of Linux Gaming" post, I hypothesized that 2023 would be a "boring" year for Linux gaming. Thus far, my prediction has proven to be correct. The Steam Deck is now being sold in East Asia though it has not really moved the needle that much as I will demonstrate soon. Some smaller developments loosely related to Linux gaming include the Xfce team working on Wayland integration, WINE inching closer to native Wayland support, and System76 making progress on its own COSMIC desktop environment.

On the latest Steam hardware survey, Linux took a marketshare of 1.44% of all operating systems which was down from 1.47% in May 2023. Of that marketshare, about 40% of Linux gamers used the Steam Deck.

From GamingOnLinux

That isn't to say there weren't any wins during this unspectacular year. On StatCounter, Linux managed to achieve over 3% of the desktop OS marketshare for the very first time since the site began collecting data.

According to BoilingSteam, the number of playable + verified games on the Steam Deck (and Linux, by extension) has eclipsed 10,000. Not only are there more playable or verified games, but Steam has been validating games at a faster pace to the point they are verified a mere day or two after release. We are also seeing plenty of games getting verified before they launch such as Falcom's The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie.

Probably the most encouraging sign is that the demand for the Steam Deck remains very healthy. Valve began the Steam Summer sale on June 29 of which one of the discounted products include the Steam Deck that consumers can acquire for as low as $360. This, in turn, caused the device to hit the top of the best selling charts. The charts are also based on dollar sales, so despite the Steam Deck bringing in less revenue per unit, the overall revenue increased because of higher unit sales.

So overall, while nothing super exciting really happened, the Linux gaming landscape continues to make steady strides.

This article is also co-published on Odysee, Publish0x, and Steemit.