Valve‘s April 2026 Steam Hardware Survey shows 67.74% of Steam users are now running Windows 11 – up 0.89 points month-over-month and a genuinely significant marker of how quickly PC gamers have moved on from Windows 10. For context, that same month Windows 10 sat at just 25.63%, meaning the gap between the two OS versions on Steam is now over 40 percentage points.
The Steam Hardware Survey is opt-in and reflects the active PC gaming population rather than general PC users – worth keeping in mind, because the divergence from the broader market is stark. Back in December 2023, Windows 11 held just 41.95% of Steam installs; by December 2024 it had climbed to 54.96%; and by December 2025 it hit a high of 70.83% – a trajectory that outpaces global adoption figures considerably, where Windows 10 still commands the majority of non-gaming PCs. The path hasn’t been perfectly smooth – February 2026 saw an unusual 10-point single-month swing back toward Windows 10 that analysts flagged as historically anomalous – but April’s figures suggest that blip has largely corrected itself.
Two-thirds of the Steam user base on Windows 11 is a meaningful threshold for developers, since it shifts the calculus on where to focus DirectX 12 and Windows 11-specific optimisation work. It also fits neatly into Microsoft‘s broader push to make Windows a more cohesive gaming platform – something the company has been leaning into hard, including the Xbox Mode rollout for Windows 11 that brings console-style features directly to PC. With Windows 10’s extended security support winding down further through 2026, the remaining quarter of Steam users still on the older OS will face increasing pressure to upgrade – and if the February anomaly was migration hesitance rather than genuine resistance, that number may shrink faster than expected.
Are you already on Windows 11, or are you one of the holdouts still on Windows 10? Sound off in the comments below, and keep your eyes on GameLuster for more breaking gaming news and Steam coverage.
