In summary:
- PCWorld reports Linux usage on Steam reached 5.3% in March 2026, doubling from 2.3% the previous year, with an estimated 20 million total Linux users.
- This growth primarily stems from Steam Deck popularity using SteamOS, though it represents only 25% of Linux users on the platform.
- Windows experienced its largest three-year drop to 60.8% market share, signaling a diversifying gaming ecosystem beyond traditional Windows dominance.
Slowly but surely, Linux is gaining a foothold in PC gaming. According to the March 2026 Steam hardware survey, 5.3 percent of users are on some flavor of Linux, compared to 92.3 percent on Windows and just 2.4 percent on macOS. One year ago, Linux was at just 2.3 percent.
The most common Linux variation is, unsurprisingly, SteamOS, the operating system Valve created more than a decade ago and now uses for the Steam Deck handheld. SteamOS is also available for other AMD-based handheld gaming PCs, most notably the Lenovo Legion Go S, and is planned to go into the upcoming (but delayed) second-gen Steam Machine. But SteamOS isn’t as big a chunk of the Linux userbase as you might think, at just a hair under 25 percent.
The generic “Other” is even more popular at 25.64 percent. A new entry, labeled simply “0 64 bit” on the graph, seems to have come out of nowhere this month, gaining a massive 17.6 percent of Linux users. Going by a rough estimate of Steam Deck users, that would mean a million new users this month, and a similar blank “64 bit” entry gained 8 percent… so I’m inclined to believe this is some kind of anomaly in the data. It could be an error, or it could be a reclassification of existing users. The next-biggest chunk is Arch Linux with 8.8 percent. I’ll be keeping an eye on this to see if Valve adjusts the numbers.
That’s a lot of Steam Deck and SteamOS users, but again, it’s less than you might think. Let’s do some speculation. If we assume 5 million active SteamOS users—which I believe to be a considerable undercount based on estimated Steam Deck sales—that would put total Linux users on Steam for the month at approximately 20 million people. Not bad at all.
I add that one should be cautious about interpreting broader market trends based on Steam users alone. This survey obviously skews toward users who are interested in PC games, and the Steam Deck presents a significant bias in the data versus the market at large. The latest report from StatCounter puts Linux at 3.1 percent of total desktop OS users worldwide as of March 2026. That’s a sizable gain since last month, but Linux is still down from a 4.6% high in August 2024. A large spike in “unknown” operating systems, almost 20 percent of detected traffic, seems to be dragging down everything. The massive increase of “bot” traffic on the web may be skewing the results.
In the same chart, Windows dropped from 66.6 percent to 60.8 percent last month, the largest drop it’s had in three years and its lowest total since the data set began in 2009. Back then Windows commanded over 95 percent of the market. Microsoft seems to be trying to woo both general users and PC gamers back to the beleaguered Windows 11, and maybe it needs to.
Author: Michael Crider, Staff Writer, PCWorld
Michael is a 15-year veteran of technology journalism, covering everything from Apple to ZTE. On PCWorld he's the resident keyboard nut, always using a new one for a review and building a new mechanical board or expanding his desktop "battlestation" in his off hours. Michael's previous bylines include Android Police, Digital Trends, Wired, Lifehacker, and How-To Geek, and he's covered events like CES and Mobile World Congress live. Michael lives in Pennsylvania where he's always looking forward to his next kayaking trip.