Happy May 4th, the day when Valve’s Steam Controller goes on sale and nothing else significant at all. It doesn’t take space wizard powers to predict that the redesigned Steam Controller is a hot item, both because it’s elusive Valve hardware and it’s the first (hopefully not the last) one available from the trio revealed last year. It went out of stock in the US less than an hour after the store opened.
Don’t buy one from a scalper. Look at me. Don’t do it. Put your credit card back in your pocket and step away from the eBay search bar. Don’t buy a Steam Controller from a scalper.
The Steam Deck has been out of stock for months as Valve deals with the same problem the entire industry has: vanishing supplies of RAM and storage, and the resulting insane price tags. It’s the same problem that’s delayed the Steam Machine and Steam Frame VR headset. Valve has said it’s hard at work on those products for a delayed 2026 release… but I wouldn’t be surprised to see them slip off the far end of the calendar.
Valve
The Steam Controller doesn’t have those problems. It doesn’t have RAM or storage, or at least not enough to actually impact production to nearly the same degree. It’s almost certain that Valve can replenish its supply much faster than the months-long drought of new Steam Deck fulfillments. I would be shocked if the Steam Controller didn’t return to the store within a few weeks, though exactly how many Valve has available and how many it will order are up in the air.
I realize this is obvious, but I need to spell it out here. If you wait a little longer, you can get a Steam Controller—and you won’t have to pay (hang on, let me check…) two hundred and eighty dollars, which is what some grifting jerkwad is asking for on eBay. (The retail price was already a bit high at $99, mind you.) Expect similar listings to pop up on Facebook Marketplace et al. in the next few days.
eBay
Some of these people snatched up Steam Controllers with the intent to scalp them, a clear and present case of rent-seeking behavior in the classic economic sense of the term. Maybe some are people just down on their luck, who ordered their Steam Controllers in earnest and realized they could use an extra hundo or two, more than they could use a neat new gaming input. (There may or may not be a LEGO Enterprise sitting unopened and unassembled in my closet, a bellwether against an economy that seems precariously close to collapse.)
In any case, don’t buy a Steam Controller from a scalper at an inflated price. Just wait a few weeks. If you’re in the market for one, odds are overwhelming that you already have some kind of functioning controller in your home to use for now. You can do this.