How Many Teraflops is the Steam Deck?
Straight away, the Steam Deck offers 1.6 teraflops of graphical power based on its custom AMD Aerith APU chipset. This places it well above the capabilities of the Nintendo Switch at 0.4 teraflops, closer to the base model Xbox One at 1.4 teraflops, but below the 4.2 teraflops offered by the PlayStation 4 Pro.
What Do Teraflops Enable a Device to Do?
But what do teraflops actually translate to for real-world gaming? In simple terms, teraflops measure how many trillion floating point operations a device can handle per second. The more teraflops, the faster a device can process complex graphical and physics calculations needed for advanced gaming visuals and performance.
For example, a higher teraflop count enables a device to render higher resolutions, more detailed textures and environments, complex particle effects, stable higher framerates, ray tracing capabilities, and immersive 3D audio.
Steam Deck Gaming Performance Examples
While on paper the Steam Deck cannot compete with modern high-end gaming PCs or consoles in terms of raw teraflop power, its impressive capabilities enable AAA gaming experiences similar to what was available on PCs and consoles during the Xbox 360/PS3 era.
According to tested benchmarks across various titles at 720p resolution, the Steam Deck offers:
- 30-60 FPS on graphically demanding games like Elden Ring, God of War, Cyberpunk 2077, Spiderman Remastered etc. with customized settings
- 60+ FPS on esports titles like DOTA 2, CS:GO, Rainbow Six Siege etc. at high settings
- 50-60 FPS on past generation AAA games like The Witcher 3, GTA V, Skyrim, Dark Souls III etc. at high settings
| Game Title | Steam Deck FPS | Settings |
| Elden Ring | 45 FPS | Custom Low |
| God of War | 40-50 FPS | Custom Medium |
| Cyberpunk 2077 | 30 FPS | Low |
| DOTA 2 | 60+ FPS | High |
So while not hitting the performance heights of high-spec gaming setups, the Steam Deck still delivers solid FPS counts on even the most recent graphically-intensive games. This speaks volumes to what its custom AMD chipset can achieve despite the thermal and power constraints inherent in a handheld form factor.
How Does Steam Deck Teraflops Compare to Other Devices?
Here‘s a comparison of how the Steam Deck‘s 1.6 teraflops stacks up against selected other gaming devices in terms of graphics power:
| Device | Teraflops | Release Year |
|---|---|---|
| Nvidia RTX 3090 Ti GPU | 83 TFLOPS | 2022 |
| Xbox Series X | 12 TFLOPS | 2020 |
| Steam Deck | 1.6 TFLOPS | 2022 |
| PlayStation 5 | 10.3 TFLOPS | 2020 |
| PlayStation 4 Pro | 4.2 TFLOPS | 2016 |
| Xbox One X | 6 TFLOPS | 2017 |
| Nintendo Switch OLED | 0.4 TFLOPS | 2021 |
As we can, see the Steam Deck offers right around the graphics power of an Xbox One, the most popular console during 2013-2016. So while it does not have hardware advantages compared to today‘s advanced consoles and gaming PCs, it matches up well against past generation mainstream gaming devices.
Expert Analysis on Steam Deck‘s Graphics Power
According to gaming tech experts, while the Steam Deck‘s AMD APU lags behind discrete mobile GPUs, it still enables an impressive level of performance considering its size, price point, and focus on portability and battery efficiency.
As Digital Foundry‘s Richard Leadbetter concludes:
"I think we were generally impressed by the Steam Deck‘s ability to run cutting-edge games, albeit pared back visually. Given its size, weight and battery life, the experience it offers remains highly compelling."
So in summary – the Steam Deck squeezes excellent 1080p-era gaming performance out of its 1.6 teraflop chipset that brings a taste of high fidelity PC gaming on the go.
