Valve's Steam Link for Android TV Adds HDR, AV1, and Surround Sound

The addition of HDR and AV1 support to Steam Link improves direct PC-to-TV game streaming quality, addressing a key feature gap for users with high-end setups. This move by Valve enhances the fidelity and efficiency of local game streaming, offering smoother visuals and better compression. The challenge remains device fragmentation; AV1's benefits are limited by the varied hardware support across Android TV devices. Future adoption rates of AV1-compatible hardware in smart TVs will dictate the full impact of these enhancements.

The Steam Link app's update to include AV1 and HDR support has been widely reported by tech outlets like Android Authority, 9to5Google, and TechSpot in November 2024. These reports emphasize the significance of AV1 for more efficient video compression and HDR for improved visual quality in game streaming. Specifically, Android Authority highlighted the addition of over 500 new device supports as a major expansion of the app's reach. TechSpot noted that while the original Steam Link hardware was discontinued, Valve continues to refine its software offering, making the free streaming service more robust. Despite the positive reception of new features, discussions on Valve's Steam community forums (November-December 2024 and into early 2025) indicate some initial user challenges with AV1, including reports of black screens on certain devices like the Fire TV Cube (3rd Gen) and questions about AV1 compatibility on NVIDIA Shield and older Steam Link hardware. Users also reported issues with controller mappings (particularly for PS5 DualSense) and lingering problems with 5.1 audio output on some Android TV devices, suggesting ongoing optimizations are needed to ensure broad and consistent feature functionality.