Steam Controller 2 orders placed after June 18 won't ship until 2027
Valve's Steam Controller 2 launched on May 4 at $99 in the US and £85 in the UK — and sold out in 30 to 40 minutes. If you're trying to order one now, the Steam store is showing delivery estimates that push into early 2027 for any orders placed from June 18 onward. That's a seven-month wait for a gamepad that most people haven't even held yet.
Valve has addressed the backlog directly on the Steam Controller page:
> "We are not planning to stop making Steam Controllers. We are monitoring current demand and matching it against how many units we can produce before the end of the year, as we want to set realistic fulfillment timelines."
The message is clear enough: production is constrained, the queue is real, and Valve isn't promising a fast fix.
The scalper problem
The Steam-exclusive distribution model — no retail partners, no MediaMarkt, no third-party restocking — means there's nowhere else to look. Scalpers spotted the gap immediately. Units appeared on eBay within days at two to three times the retail price, per GameStar.de and confirmed by Gagadget.de. In the UK, where £85 already undercuts the US price by roughly $12, eBay listings quickly hit £150–200.
What you're waiting for
The hardware itself is a genuine departure from standard gamepads. Two 34.5mm square trackpads with haptic feedback and adjustable click force sit where you'd normally find face buttons. There are also two TMR thumbsticks (designed to resist wear), four rear grip buttons, six-axis gyroscope, and four rumble motors. Battery life is rated at over 35 hours.
The wireless 2.4GHz "Puck" dongle doubles as a magnetic charging dock — a neat detail that also cuts input latency to around 8ms. The controller works over Bluetooth and USB-C too, and connects to any device that runs Steam, including the upcoming Steam Machine.
The controller is built for strategy games, PC-style interfaces, and couch computing — tasks where a mouse feels clunky at a distance. It's larger than most standard gamepads and has no rubberized grip panels, which is worth knowing before committing.
The wait
Early adopters who ordered on launch day are already receiving units. Everyone else is in line. If you're not in a hurry and don't want to pay scalper prices, placing an order now locks in your spot — just expect it to land sometime in the new year. OC3D confirmed the US and UK pricing at launch; the delivery timeline is showing live on Steam.
