Following the sizeable launch of Valve’s Steam Deck, a multitude of PC gaming handhelds rapidly released across the market. However, even with the marketing might of Xbox behind it, ASUS’ ROG Xbox Ally has failed to come anywhere near the success of Valve’s offering.

While the Steam Deck does have some issues, such as being incompatible with many titles that make use of anti-cheat, the handheld is clearly the favourite amongst a continually growing number of competitors.

In an interview on the Xbox Expansion Pass podcast, trusted industry analyst Matt Piscatella discussed the popularity of the ROG Xbox Ally series of handhelds in relation to Valve’s Steam Deck.

“It had a nice month one,” the analyst explained, “and has come back down quite significantly since then. And you’re not talking massive amounts of volume there.” With a significantly higher price than Valve’s offering and its own number of software flaws, the Windows-based PC gaming handheld simply isn’t gripping users.

“It’s kind of just chugging along at, you know, what you’d expect for that price point for that type of audience,” the analyst continued. “It’s just kind of… it’s hanging out being groovy.” Unfortunately, as a major element of Microsoft’s “This is an Xbox” marketing spiel, “being groovy” likely isn’t good enough.

In the podcast episode, Piscatella was asked if the ROG Xbox Ally line of handhelds has “put a dent in the Steam Deck”, essentially asking if the handheld has sold a decent percentage of overall sales in comparison. In response, they succinctly responded: “no”.

In a report by The Verge in February last year, it was claimed thaat the Steam Deck had sold more units than the ASUS ROG Ally, Lenovo Legion Go and MSI Claw combined. Market research firm IDC, which tracks supply chains across the world, estimated that around 4 million Steam Deck handhelds had been sold by February 2025.

However, it’s worth noting that these handhelds are not designed to sell tens of millions of units like a Nintendo Switch 2 or other console, hence their higher price point. However, on Valve’s side, Steam Deck is more than just a product, but also a device that is helping to cement the company’s aim of improving gaming on Linux.

Unfortunately, the Steam Deck and Valve’s upcoming Steam Machine are both facing massive supply issues due to the ongoing RAM shortage caused by AI datacenters, At the time of publication, there is no concrete release date for the latter device.