In Valve's "Steam Hardware & Software Survey" for August 2026, Linux's usage share fell to 3.90%. That's down 0.11 points from the previous month, dropping back below 4% after July's 4.01%. Still, compared to the same month last year, at 2.64%, it's up 1.26 points. With SteamOS Holo's share declining even as other Linux environments grew, a single month's boundary crossing isn't enough to declare a reversal in growth.
Up 1.26 Points From a Year Ago, But Down From March's Peak
Linux's usage share rose 1.26 points from 2.64% in August 2025 to 3.90% in August 2026, but it's down 1.43 points from March 2026's 5.33%. The conclusion differs depending on whether you compare against the monthly peak or the same month a year earlier.
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| Linux (%) | |
|---|---|
| Aug 2025 | 2.64 |
| Mar 2026 | 5.33 |
| Aug 2026 | 3.9 |
March's 5.33% figure was a jump of 3.10 points from the previous month. In that same month, Windows dropped 4.28 points while macOS rose 1.19 points. Whether this reflects actual OS migration among users or simply shifts in who responded to the survey can't be determined from public data alone.
The sheer size of this swing is itself a reason to favor tracking the trend over time rather than any single figure that happens to cross a threshold.
That's not to dismiss August's 0.11-point month-over-month drop. But converting the year-over-year change from 2.64% to 3.90% into a relative figure yields a 47.7% increase. August's number is higher than the same month last year, yet this single data point alone can't confirm either sustained growth or a reversal.
Focusing Only on SteamOS Risks Misreading Linux's Broader Reach
Steam's survey uses two different denominators. In the all-platform aggregate view, SteamOS Holo accounts for 0.82% of all respondents, down 0.07 points from the previous month. But when narrowed to Linux respondents only, it accounts for 21.07%, down 1.17 points. Both figures describe the same category, but the former represents Steam overall, while the latter represents the composition within Linux respondents.
| Linux Environment | Share of All Respondents | Change from Prior Month | Share Among Linux Respondents | Change from Prior Month |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SteamOS Holo | 0.82% | -0.07pt | 21.07% | -1.17pt |
| CachyOS | 0.60% | +0.03pt | 15.47% | +1.16pt |
| Arch Linux | 0.34% | +0.01pt | 8.78% | +0.49pt |
| Linux Mint 22.3 | 0.33% | 0.00pt | 8.38% | +0.26pt |
| Bazzite | 0.30% | -0.01pt | 7.76% | +0.03pt |
While SteamOS Holo declined, CachyOS and Arch Linux both grew even as a share of all respondents. The top five Linux entries together total 61.46%, but even the largest, SteamOS Holo, falls short of a majority. In other words, SteamOS Holo's rise or fall alone can't be treated as representative of the entire Linux landscape on Steam.
These two views aren't separate survey results. Multiplying Linux's 3.90% by SteamOS Holo's 21.07% among Linux respondents yields 0.82% of all respondents, matching after rounding. The same calculation for CachyOS also yields 0.60%. When reading changes in the breakdown, it's important to keep track of which denominator—all respondents or Linux respondents—a given figure is based on.
In August 2026, SteamOS Holo accounted for 21.07% among Linux respondents but only 0.82% of all Steam respondents. Subtracting 0.82% from Linux's overall 3.90% suggests that Linux environments other than SteamOS Holo make up roughly 3.08% of all respondents, based on a rough calculation from the displayed figures.
This 3.08-point figure is only an approximation derived by subtracting displayed values. Devices running SteamOS Holo aren't limited to Steam Deck, and the survey data provides no way to separate device counts or account for users with multiple devices. Even so, the overall scale suggests that environments other than SteamOS Holo make up the majority of Linux's usage share.
A 0.11-Point Drop Shouldn't Be Read as a Reversal of Growth
In August, Simplified Chinese rose 1.45 points to 23.97% among all respondents, while English fell 1.36 points to 38.25%. Among Linux respondents specifically, Simplified Chinese rose 0.19 points to 1.57%, while English fell 0.68 points to 82.54%. Since the overall language composition differs substantially from the language composition within Linux respondents, shifts in which regions or language groups contribute more respondents could also move OS ratios.
However, the fact that Simplified Chinese rose in the same month Linux fell doesn't prove causation. A Steam interface language setting is not the same thing as nationality or country of residence. Valve states that the survey runs monthly and that participation is voluntary and anonymous, but the public page provides no sample size, sampling method, response rate, or margin of error. Whether a 0.11-point difference is statistically significant simply can't be determined.
This survey is most useful for tracking the same category over an extended period and capturing changes across multiple months. Conversely, calculating user counts or unit sales from a single month's shift means filling in an undisclosed base population with outdated monthly active user figures or similar proxies. The 3.90% figure represents a breakdown of responses to Steam's voluntary survey—it is not a measure of overall PC market OS share.
What's more, the survey's reported changes are rounded to two decimal places. Summing the month-over-month change with the changes in individual line items may not perfectly reconcile due to rounding. The apparent precision of a 0.11-point figure doesn't match the level of precision the survey's design can actually guarantee.
Measuring the Options Proton Opened Up Requires Tracking Monthly Figures Over Time
The range of games playable on Linux changed after Valve integrated Proton into Steam Play in 2018. Proton is a compatibility layer built on Wine that lets Windows-only games without native Linux versions be installed and run through the Linux client. Valve currently states that more than 18,000 titles run on SteamOS.
At present, the officially supported SteamOS devices are Steam Deck and Legion Go S, and Valve is expanding compatibility to other AMD-powered handheld PCs. Gaming-focused Linux distributions like Bazzite have also become their own line item in the survey. From a game publisher's perspective, counting only native Linux sales figures wouldn't capture the audience playing through Proton or the demand for SteamOS devices.
That said, how much of the rise to 3.90% can be attributed to Proton or handheld PCs can't be isolated from the public survey data. Judging whether this growth is sustained will require tracking whether the figure continues to exceed the same month a year earlier, and whether the roughly 3.08-point estimate for non-SteamOS-Holo Linux environments holds steady. If Valve were to disclose sample sizes and a device-level breakdown, it would become possible to measure precisely where Linux gaming is expanding—rather than simply watching whether it crosses the 4% line.