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Steam Reveals The Most Popular PC Specs For December 2017
Steam is a powerhouse in the PC gaming space, reaching a recent milestone of over 18 million concurrent users. Every month, the company surveys its users to find out what operating system, video card, and other PC components they use, and the results often give a glimpse into how well the average user is running PC games.
The latest results shouldn't be too surprising, but with a number of new products released this year, it's interesting to see which ones catch on and how the power curve is distributed. To start, here are all the most common components Valve surveyed its users on. The survey is opt-in, however, so it's not a 100-percent accurate picture Steam's demographics.
- Operating system: Windows 7 64 bit
- RAM: 8GB
- Intel CPU Speed: 3.0 to 3.29Ghz
- Number of Physical CPUs: 4
- Video Card: Nvidia Geforce GTX 1060
- VRAM: 2047 MB
- Primary monitor resolution: 1920x1080
- Multi-monitor resolution: 3840x1080
- Percentage of users with a Microphone: 99.84 percent
- Language: Simplified Chinese
- Free hard drive space: 100-249GB
- Total hard drive space: 1+TB
- Network speed: Unspecified
- VR Headset: Oculus Rift
Expanding each category reveals a few more tidbits. Mac OS users make up only 1.42 percent of Steam's total users, while Linux is only .26 percent. Meanwhile, only 3.30 percent of Steam users have CPUs with clock speeds of 3.7Ghz or more, which means Steam and developers are wise to focus building their games around GPU caps instead of CPU caps. Speaking of which, the 1060 being the most common video card means most PC players are just fine having a GPU comparable to an Xbox One X. Finally, the Rift being the most popular VR headset on Valve's service may lead the company to consider more options for cross-compatibility with its own HTC Vive down the line.
[Source: Steam hardware survey]
Our Take
If someone in CS:Go, Dota 2, or PUBG tells you they don't have a microphone, they're probably lying. Also, interesting (if not super-surprising) to see Steam's biggest userbase seems to be in China. Or maybe they're much more likely to opt into the survey?
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