Valve has announced that its Steam app will no longer support 32-bit versions of Windows starting January 1, 2026.
The company will continue to support 64-bit versions of Windows 10 and Windows 11, but for anyone still running 32-bit Windows, it’s game over.
Currently, Windows 10 is the only 32-bit version of Windows that Steam supports. Microsoft will officially end support for Windows 10 next month, but Valve plans to keep Steam running on its 64-bit editions. Importantly, players will still be able to run 32-bit games through Steam—just not install the Steam client itself on a 32-bit system.
The change comes with some irony: Steam itself has long been a 32-bit app across all versions of Windows. That, however, will change soon. “Future versions of Steam will run on 64-bit versions of Windows only,” Valve said in a support note. The company explained that this move is necessary because many of Steam’s core features now rely on drivers and libraries that are no longer supported on 32-bit systems.
For most gamers, the impact will be negligible. Valve’s own Steam Hardware Survey shows that just 0.01% of users are still running the 32-bit version of Windows 10.
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