Valve has added a feature to the Steam Deck that you might be surprised wasn’t there all along: Display-Off Downloads. Now, the console can download games with the screen off, entering a new low-power download mode before going to sleep upon completion.
This new mode is now in the Beta and Preview channels of SteamOS, and will be rolled out to all users eventually. At that point, it will be the default mode when the Steam Deck is plugged in to power, and can be enabled when on battery power manually under Settings > Power.
If you’re downloading a game or updates at the time that you press the power button to turn off the Steam Deck, it will prompt if you’d like to continue downloading with the screen off. It will also enter this mode automatically after being idle for some time. While downloading, you’ll be able to check on downloads by waking the screen, and can fully wake or let it continue.
When using this with battery power, the Steam Deck will halt downloads and go to full sleep if the battery drops below 20%.
Display-off downloads are similar in concept to the standby mode downloads and updates that are possible on Xbox, PS5 and Switch, but with SteamOS being built on a branch of Linux, it’s much more like a PC in some of its workings. This is a good step closer to the console experience, when compared to needing to manually enable and enter more basic screen-off modes as with Windows-based handhelds, laptops and PCs.
Source: Steam
