‘Steam has one million extra VR users since the release of Half-Life: Alyx’

The number of Steam users who have connected a VR headset increased by about a million in April. This is probably mainly due to the release of VR game Half-Lyfe: Alyx at the end of March.

The figure comes from Steam’s latest Hardware Survey data, which Road to VR analyzed. During April, 1.91 percent of Steam users had a VR headset connected to their PC. That is by far the highest percentage to date and it is also the largest increase ever. The growth was three times faster than the previous growth spurt, which took place between December 2019 and January 2020.

Valve only mentions percentages but does not give numbers. Road to VR claims to use its own models to calculate percentages into numbers based on historical data and official data points from Valve. This would show that almost 950,000 VR users were added in April. This brings the total to 2.7 million connected VR headsets. Valve’s Index headset has a market share of 11.9 percent. Oculus is at the top with 44.6 percent and HTC is in second place with 30.3 percent.

Steam can see if users have a VR headset connected to their PC if users participate in the voluntary Hardware Survey. It is impossible to say how many of the VR users have purchased a new headset. It could also be users who already had a headset and plugged it back in to play Half-Life: Alyx.