Steam Pyrowave Remote Play Codec: High-Bandwidth, Low-Latency Streaming on Windows

Pyrowave is now in the Steam Client beta. For Windows users, the main case is a gaming PC acting as the streaming host for another machine elsewhere in the house. It is experimental, it's off by default, and Valve is clear that it won't help every setup.

What Valve actually shipped​

Valve added the experimental codec to Steam Remote Play in the Steam Client Preview/Beta channel on September 21, 2026, and it is switched off by default. The beta changelog gives it one line: "Added an experimental video codec, Pyrowave, which allows high bandwidth, low latency video streaming".

Here are the main points from Valve's announcement in the Steam Remote Play community group:

• Platforms: It is available now in Steam beta on macOS and Windows. It's available in Steam beta on Linux if you enable the experimental SteamRT3 Steam Client, available in System Settings. This is coming soon to the Steam Link app for mobile devices. Mobile Steam Link support is only a promise so far.
• Creator: It was created by Hans-Kristian Arntzen, a graphics developer best known in PC gaming circles for his work on the vkd3d-proton translation layer.
• Bandwidth: The codec uses 5-10 times the amount of bandwidth of other streaming codecs, so you'll want to have your computers connected directly to your router with at least Gigabit ethernet.
• Latency: It uses the GPU to encode and decode frames to achieve extremely low end to end latency with a good network.
• Colour and HDR: HDR is automatically selected if supported by both the host and the client. YUV 4:4:4 takes slightly more bandwidth and processing time, so it's not enabled by default, but can be turned on if you're streaming your desktop or reading text on a 4K display.

This isn't Pyrowave's first appearance. GamingOnLinux reports that it was briefly added in a previous release a while back, then removed. That suggests Valve now thinks it's ready for wider testing, but "experimental" is still the right word.

Section summary: Pyrowave is an opt-in beta codec for Windows, macOS and Linux (through SteamRT3). It makes one trade, and says so openly: much more bandwidth in exchange for much lower latency.

Why a codec would want more bandwidth​

H.264, HEVC and AV1 all save bandwidth by exploiting redundancy between frames. They predict what changed from the last frame, encode the difference, then compress the result with entropy coding. That's very efficient, but it takes time, and in game streaming every millisecond of that time sits between your mouse click and what you see on screen.

XDA Developers, citing Arntzen's project documentation, says Pyrowave is practically a still-image codec. Each frame is compressed on its own, with no motion prediction from the frames around it. Reporting from Kantan News adds that frames are processed independently and encoded and decoded directly on the GPU; using Vulkan compute shaders, the codec can reach encode and decode times under 0.1 ms at 1080p and under 0.2 ms at 4K. Those numbers are the project's own targets, not independent benchmarks, and they will vary with your GPU.

Pyrowave still compresses the image. What it drops is the costly work of predicting across frames. That makes each frame larger, and it also means each frame can be handled quickly and in parallel. For comparison, TweakTown notes that typical recommended AV1 bitrates run from 4Mbps to 50Mbps for 1080p, 1440p and 4K, while Pyrowave's minimum setting in Steam is reportedly 100 Mbps, with a maximum of 500Mbps.

Think of HEVC as a courier who packs your suitcase perfectly before leaving the house. Pyrowave throws everything in the trunk and drives off, because the road is wide and the trip is short.

Section summary: Pyrowave isn't a more efficient codec, just a faster one. It spends bandwidth to save time, and only a fast local network makes that worthwhile.

The latency maths Valve wants you to understand​

Valve is refreshingly modest here. The announcement says total stream latency is the time for encode, plus network, plus decode, plus display. You can see this by turning on the performance graph in the Remote Play settings while you're streaming. Because total latency combines codec time with network time, Valve says your setup may or may not benefit.

This is the most important practical point. A codec that encodes in a fraction of a millisecond can't fix a flaky wireless link or a slow display pipeline on the client. If your network is the bottleneck, Pyrowave makes the codec part of the delay tiny while the rest stays the same, and it may even make network congestion worse because it pushes so much data.

One reviewer's hands-on numbers​

XDA Developers' Ty Sherback tested Pyrowave with a wired Windows desktop as the host and two very different clients. Treat these figures as one reviewer's setup, not general benchmarks.

More details from that testing:

• Steam's overlay reportedly showed about 400–480 Mbit/s of video with HDR and 4:4:4 enabled. That's the reviewer's measurement, not a Valve specification.
• On the wired client, with bandwidth limits set to unlimited, the image reportedly looked the same as on the host. The reviewer could still tell the game was being streamed, but said it was far from unplayable in fast shooters.
• The Wi-Fi client still felt smooth in Tarkov. When the reviewer moved around the house or lost a strong 5GHz signal, though, the experience got much worse and latency spiked sharply.
• On the Linux client, the mouse felt stuttery and inconsistent. The reviewer suspected the 8,000 Hz polling-rate mouse or how Linux handles input, but couldn't find the cause. A different input device on the other client didn't have the problem.
• All tests ran with 4:4:4 enabled, which is a deliberately worst-case setting for bandwidth.

XDA also reports Arntzen saying that internet streaming at these bitrates isn't feasible outside peer-to-peer fibre links. That's XDA's attribution. Valve's own guidance, wired Gigabit to the router, points the same way: this is for streaming inside your home.

Section summary: Wired, the results look excellent. On Wi-Fi it can still be playable, but it's fragile. The gap between the two clients shows Valve's warning in practice: the codec is fast, and the rest of the chain decides the outcome.

How to try Pyrowave on Windows​

1. Join the beta. TechRounder's walkthrough says to open Steam Settings and go to Interface, then choose Steam Beta Update under Client Beta Participation. Restart Steam when asked. Do this on both the host and the client.
2. Check your build. In Valve's announcement thread, Valve's Sam Lantinga (posting as slouken) told users who couldn't see the option to check that Steam shows the "Steam Beta Update" branch with client version 1790036264 (built September 21, 2026) or later.
3. Linux or SteamOS clients: enable the experimental SteamRT3 client first. GamingOnLinux notes that on desktop it's a toggle at the bottom of Interface, and on SteamOS (Steam Deck / Steam Machine) it's in the System settings.
4. Turn on the codec. Pyrowave isn't enabled by default, but you can turn it on in the Steam Remote Play advanced client settings. That's on the client, before you start streaming.
5. Start with automatic bitrate. Valve says Steam normally tunes for visual quality. Each frame will have a constant size designed to look good, and the higher your framerate, the higher the bandwidth needed. A quality slider raises or lowers that, and bandwidth changes with it.
6. Cap the bitrate if you need to. You can disable automatic bitrate control and manually select between 100 and 500 Mbit/s.
7. Try 4:4:4 separately. It's worth it for desktop work or small text on a 4K display. Change one setting at a time so you know what caused any difference.
8. Turn on the performance graph and compare encode, network, decode and display times against your usual HEVC or AV1 stream.

Common failure points​

• The option isn't there. Several users in Valve's thread couldn't see Pyrowave at first. One suspected the beta simply hadn't been pushed yet, and Valve then asked them to try again. Update Steam again and confirm the build number above.
• The option turns itself off when streaming starts. One user reported exactly that, and noted that the Steam Link mobile app has no Pyrowave option yet, so it used its own settings. Remember that mobile support is still marked "coming soon."
• Stutter or latency spikes on Wi-Fi. Test on Ethernet first. TechRounder puts it bluntly: the codec is less suitable for a congested Wi-Fi network or a connection with a strict bandwidth limit.
• Choppy input on a Linux client. Before you blame the codec, try a different mouse or a lower polling rate.

Who should care, and who shouldn't​

Pyrowave could suit you if you have a wired Gigabit (or faster) home network, a gaming PC in one room and a second machine near a TV or desk, and you notice latency in competitive shooters. It could also suit anyone who remote-controls a Windows desktop and wants sharp text, since 4:4:4 avoids the colour smearing that 4:2:0 streams put around fine detail.

It's probably not for you if you're on Wi-Fi far from your router, if you share bandwidth with a busy household, or if you want to stream over the internet. At several hundred megabits per second, Pyrowave can use up a Gigabit link in a way a 30 Mbit/s HEVC stream never would. Your NAS backups and your family's video calls will notice, too.

This also puts Steam in closer competition with the Sunshine/Moonlight combination that enthusiasts often prefer. One commenter in Valve's thread said Moonlight with H.265 struggled with hard-to-encode scenes such as volumetric fog, even at 300 Mbit/s. Another said Steam's own streaming had often felt too laggy or blurry by comparison. An intra-only, high-bitrate codec aims straight at those complaints. Whether it delivers across different GPUs, drivers and networks is exactly what this beta is meant to find out.

The bottom line​

Game streaming has always meant compressing the image hard enough to fit the network and then putting up with the delay that compression adds. Pyrowave removes most of that delay, but only if you can supply the bandwidth. Early hands-on results on wired networks are impressive, Wi-Fi results are hit-and-miss, and Valve says honestly that your results will vary. If your house is wired, turning on the beta costs you only a few minutes of testing.