Nvidia is bringing a native GeForce NOW app to Steam Deck
There has been a tidal wave of exciting handheld gaming news recently, but one story got slightly buried under the mountain of Legion Go S details and Switch 2 rumors. That would be the announcement that Nvidia is developing a native GeForce NOW app for the Steam Deck.
“Trillion-dollar corporation frequently derided by Linux community develops native software for a single Linux gaming device” certainly wasn’t on my 2025 bingo card. But I’m very pleased that it’s happening.
Benefits Of Nvidia GeForce NOW For Steam Deck
GeForce NOW is a cloud gaming service that lets you play games you’ve purchased on platforms like Steam, Ubisoft, EA, and Epic Games on pretty much any internet-connected device. The hook is that you don’t need an exorbitantly expensive gaming PC for your games to look like they’re being played on one.
For slightly under-powered handhelds like Steam Deck, this presents a range of potential benefits. It provides the convenience of playing your non-Steam library without a bunch of workarounds, tweaks, or tutorials. It also opens the door to enjoying certain games that won’t even run on Valve’s handheld. Plus, your battery won’t have a meltdown, and you can enjoy these streamed games at up to 4K/60FPS an external monitor or TV connected to your Steam Deck.
Of course, the official way to currently install Nvidia’s GeForce NOW on Steam Deck involves switching into desktop mode, downloading a script, extracting that script, and then installing it.
(It would be fascinating to know how many people have even launched Desktop Mode a single time on their Steam Decks, but I suspect it’s a very low percentage).
While we’re not yet sure how the native app, which Nvidia says is scheduled to ship “later this year,” will be delivered to Steam Deck users, it will certainly be a more elegant and streamlined method. And this is a big deal.
But why does this matter? What kind of impact might it have? Might it pave the way for more high-profile software to extend beyond Windows and onto Linux in generl?
In order to present a wider perspective, I asked a few prominent members of the Linux community to chime in with their thoughts.
Thomas Crider (aka GloriousEggroll) | Nobara, Red Hat
GloriousEggroll needs no introduction to people closely following the Linux gaming space. In a nutshell, he’s a wizard who works at Red Hat by day and makes Linux gaming better at night. He’s the creator of Proton-GE as well as the gaming-forward Nobara Linux distribution, and he contributes to Lutris.
Here’s what he told me:
“I think it’s a great thing that SteamOS is becoming a bigger target. By becoming more mainstream, it’s giving vendors real reasons to both develop for and benefit from consumer Linux applications and drivers they may provide. Those contributions from other vendors in turn make the Linux ecosystem much more robust for