In summary:
- PCWorld observes that Xbox appears to be losing ground as gaming shifts toward PC-based living room experiences, with handheld PCs and cloud streaming leading this transformation.
- Valve’s Steam Deck shows 20% of users dock their devices for TV gaming, while rumors suggest Microsoft’s next Xbox may actually run Windows rather than proprietary console hardware.
- This shift matters because it offers superior gaming experiences through services like GeForce Now on smart TVs and versatile handheld PCs that double as home consoles.
While wandering the show floor at CES 2026, I was struck by the future of living room gaming. What was once the realm of gaming consoles seems to be turning into PC territory. Handheld gaming PCs are now a mainstay in PC showcases alongside laptops, and lots of companies have third-party docks for TV gaming (à la the Nintendo Switch).
Just as Valve’s Steam Deck kicked off the age of handheld PC gaming, Valve’s forthcoming Steam Machine will probably kick off another battle over living room gaming, with future Xbox hardware widely expected to be based on Windows. Meanwhile, Intel and AMD are also squabbling over handheld gaming hardware. And GeForce Now ensures that even if you don’t have a PC in your living room, there’s a good chance your smart TV can stream PC games from Nvidia’s cloud servers.
We know that PCs are the future for living room gaming. The question is whether Windows or SteamOS will emerge as king.
Handheld PCs and docks everywhere
When you see all the new hardware from companies like Asus and Lenovo, you’ll find handheld gaming PCs right alongside their gaming laptops. It’s awesome. Handheld gaming PCs are everywhere now, even in demonstrations showing off fanless cooling technology.
But they’re also sneaking into the living room. This year, in the far corners of the Las Vegas Convention Center show floor, I saw quite a few docks intended for machines like the Steam Deck, Lenovo Legion Go, Asus ROG Xbox Ally, and other handhelds. They’re a hot product.
Chris Hoffman / Foundry
According to Valve, 20 percent of Steam Deck owners use the official docking station with their Deck, and that number doesn’t count all the other Steam Deck owners who use third-party docks. I own a Steam Deck and the official docking station, and it delivers a nice living room gaming PC experience, albeit with some quirks. Learn more about how I turned my Steam Deck into a living room console.
GeForce Now brings PC games to TVs
Back at CES 2015, Razer announced the Razer Forge: an Android-based living room gaming console. With Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo absent from CES 2015 and not showing off their consoles, this was the type of machine you found in those days.
Indeed, back then, the future of living room gaming seemed to look toward mobile platforms. Apple has its Apple TV hardware, which can install games from the App Store. With smart TV platforms running operating systems—both the Google Chromecast and Amazon Fire Stick run Android-derived operating systems under the hood—it seemed like living room gaming on smart TVs might hit their peak with Flappy Bird-style hypercasual games from mobile app stores.
But that never even took off. Instead, we’re now seeing Nvidia make big inroads with GeForce Now. Your future smart TV won’t have powerful PC gaming hardware built into it—rather, it’ll connect to Nvidia’s servers and stream PC games directly from the cloud.
Nvidia
At CES 2026, Nvidia brought GeForce Now to Amazon Fire TV devices. On the show floor, I walked by a variety of smart TVs that proudly advertised built-in GeForce Now support. With a Bluetooth controller, a smart TV, and a fast internet connection, you can now play high-end modern 3D PC games directly on a TV.
I prefer running PC games locally on my gaming PC, but if I was going to game on a smart TV in my living room, I’d rather play “real” PC games running in the cloud than Candy Crush Saga running on the TV.
The Steam Machine vs. future Xbox
The one thing that still isn’t common is serious desktop PC hardware that plugs into the TV, console-style, delivering a living room gaming experience with more power.
Valve’s forthcoming Steam Machine will deliver that gaming PC experience that’s optimized for the living room. Meanwhile, rumor is that Microsoft’s next Xbox will be a Windows PC. Forget the customized Xbox system and proprietary hardware. Microsoft already feels like it’s giving up on the Xbox as a console platform, with Xbox hardware sales at an all-time low. Microsoft wants the Xbox to be a cross-device gaming platform, not a console like a PlayStation or Nintendo Switch.
I’m surprised no PC manufacturer has leaped ahead of Valve and Microsoft with their own console-style machine that runs Windows. But competition is ramping up. There’s a new full-screen Xbox experience that’s coming to all Windows PCs, and Lenovo has delivered a full-screen gaming interface optimized for the Legion Go since 2023.
PCs are the future of living room gaming
Sony’s PlayStation 5 owns the traditional console market now that Microsoft no longer seems interested. And as long as Nintendo keeps its games exclusive, there will always be a place for Nintendo’s own consoles like the Switch 2.
But aside from that, where are the alternatives? Apple has never been interested in gaming, so it’s no surprise that the Apple TV hardware isn’t a particularly interesting gaming platform, despite stronger hardware than the average living room streaming box and integration with the Apple Arcade subscription service. For smart TVs, the dream of simple mobile games on the TV has been dead for years. TV manufacturers would rather wow you with PC games on GeForce Now than show off mobile games on their 4K TVs—and for good reason.
Meanwhile, docked handheld PCs are all the rage now. But I bet there are a lot of desktop PCs and gaming laptops plugged directly into TVs out there, too. For more than a decade, I’ve plugged gaming laptops and desktops right into my TV and had a great experience in the living room. Now, everyone is realizing how awesome PCs are as a living room gaming platform—and I’m excited to see where this goes.
Author: Chris Hoffman, Contributor, PCWorld
Chris Hoffman is the author of The Windows Readme, a newsletter that brings Windows PC tips, tricks, and experiments to more than 10,000 email inboxes each week. He's also the former editor-in-chief of How-To Geek and a veteran tech journalist whose work has appeared in The New York Times, PCMag, Reader's Digest, and other publications.