The Steam Deck just launched, but a few owners are already reporting stick drift

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

A few of the handheld gaming PCs are showing signs of joystick drift, but the first batches of steam decks are starting to arrive to the lucky few who could order them on Friday.

When you don't actually push the joystick in a direction, it causes your character to keep moving in the game. It is a problem many have experienced with the Nintendo Switch controllers. Nintendo has suggested that the issue will never be fully addressed because Joy-Con will wear down over time, but it does repair drifting Joy-Con controllers for free. It seems that the Steam Deck's thumbsticks may be susceptible to drift, as some have reported issues with the PS5 controllers.

There are times when one of the thumbsticks continues to register an input while the user is not touching the stick. The issue was registered in the steam deck's calibration checker by two of the users.

It is unclear how widespread the drift issues are since it is appearing on brand-new Steam Decks. In an interview with The Washington Post, Valve's Pierre-Loup Griffais estimated that tens of thousands of people are getting their Decks, but there are still only a few videos documenting the problem. Sean Hollister told me on Tuesday that the joysticks on his review unit haven't shown any drift issues so far, even when he tried the same calibration checker.

A request for comment was not immediately responded to by Valve. If you see stick drift on your Deck, the company will offer replacement parts at some point, including thumbsticks.

If you're experiencing steam deck thumbstick drift, you can buy a replacement part yourself. A guide on how to calibrate a thumbstick in the device's settings could be a short-term solution.

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