Pre-Built PC Handheld PCs & Peripherals Valve Steam Frame VR Review vs. Meta Quest 3 | Privacy, Latency, & Benchmarks September 23, 2026 Last Updated: 2026-09-23 Our review and benchmarks primarily compare the Valve Steam Frame vs. the Meta Quest 3 headsets, including sections on privacy and data security, latency benchmarks, thermal benchmarks, battery life testing, charge time testing, and more The Highlights Compared to Meta, we’re much more comfortable with Valve’s data collection stance The Steam Frame’s passthrough cameras suck and Valve should include its optional top headstrap The Steam Frame offers better overall latency testing compared to the Quest 3 with its included adapter, but it also offers worse battery life according to our tests Original MSRP: $1060 (256GB model), $1300 (1TB model) Release Date: September 2026 Table of Contents AutoTOC Visit our Patreon page to contribute a few dollars toward this website's operation (or consider a direct donation or buying something from our GN Store!) Additionally, when you purchase through links to retailers on our site, we may earn a small affiliate commission. Intro The Valve Steam Frame costs $1,049 US for the 256GB model and $1,299 US for 1TB. The only information we had about the Frame's price until now was when Valve told us that it wouldn't cost more than the Index, which was $1,000, and that it’d launch in early 2026. You may have noticed that $1,049 is more than $999, and also that it isn't "early 2026" right now. Meta’s Quest 3 is the big competition: Editor's note: This was originally published on September 14, 2026 as a video. This content has been adapted to written format for this article and is unchanged from the original publication. Credits Test Lead, Host, Writing Steve Burke Testing, Writing Patrick Lathan Testing, Video Editing, Camera Mike Gaglione Camera, Video Editing Vitalii MakhnovetsTim Phetdara Writer Tannen Williams Writing, Web Editing Jimmy Thang The Quest 3 costs $600 currently -- and also your first born, alongside video and voice data from inside of your house, scans of your room, your body movements, facial expressions, reading around 83,000 words of agreements, and depending on how much you spam-agree to, “audio recordings of your child’s voice, “Physical information about or related to your child,” “Headset location,” “your child’s connections to others,” “your child’s activity in Meta Quest devices and apps” (like apps downloaded, gameplay activity and stats, content created as well as the time, frequency, and duration of activities), and, with approval, “the size of walls, surfaces, and objects in your child’s room” We asked Valve if it needed those things, they didn’t need 83,000 words to answer us. The answer was one word: No. We have a ton of other tests, too: In latency testing, Valve overall had a favorable position as compared to the Quest 3; however, the Quest 3 had a favorable position as compared to Valve in battery life testing. Thermal testing also came into play. One of the big tests we did for this was thermals to represent comfort in an objective sense. We used a Fluke RSE600 thermal imaging camera, which is connected to a laptop. The purpose of this test is to look at not just the external temperature of the headset, which isn’t too important, but to examine the temperature of your face when you're wearing it. We then take that data and compare it between the Frame and the Quest 3 to get an objective read on the human factors skin temperature. And thermal results position the Frame as having some objective advantages in comfort, alongside the subjective opinions from our team. Mike on the team stated, “The Frame definitely felt a lot more comfortable just as a whole.” Patrick stated, “This, out of the box, is a lot more comfortable.” The price is the worst part of the Frame, especially as Valve broke its promise related to price, and it’s not just the Frame alone: The accessories kit is $60 for straps that we really think are mandatory, seeing as you need them to make full use of some advertised features. The charging cable is $30 and isn’t included, the cushion replacement with gasket and light blocker is $50. So, the price is the rough part with the Frame, but the price is also the rough part with the far cheaper Meta. It's just that you're paying for it with literally everything about you. If you thought LG's terms were bad? Jesus Fuck! That's all we have to say about this one. The market started to get bad right when Valve announced the Steam Frame in November, and in the time since, memory prices have gone up on average 350-600%, depending on which spec of memory you look at, and storage has increased by more than double. We have a lot to test today with the Frame. This review is actually the first hardware review where we’ve added privacy & security as a significant section of the content, and that’s all thanks to your backing. Steam Frame Overview Today, we’re focusing on the Meta Quest 3 and the Valve Steam Frame. The reason for this is that, in the 2 weeks we’ve been working on testing, we’ve already fully maxed-out our available hours just for those two headsets. Rather than doing shallow depth across a lot of headsets, we’re focusing our efforts on going in-depth for the main two. PiMax and Bigscreen also exist, but we haven’t tested them yet. Meta completely dominates the VR market, even on Valve's own PC hardware survey, and the Quest 3 is its flagship. What's Included with the Steam Frame The specs are public, but here's a rundown: the Frame has a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 8650 SOC, 16GB LPDDR5X (combined system/VRAM), 256GB or 1TB of onboard storage with a microSD card slot for expansion, 2160x2160 LCDs with pancake lenses, refresh rates from 72-144Hz (144Hz is "experimental”), FOV up to 110 degrees, four external IR-sensitive monochrome cameras, two internal eye-tracking cameras, an expansion port with both a single PCIe Gen 4 lane and "8 lanes @ 2.5Gbps MIPI," WiFi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, and a 21.6Wh battery on the headstrap. The whole thing weighs about 445g, +/- 1g, by our measurements. The core module containing the computer, optics, screens, and all the other expensive stuff locks into the modular headstrap, which only contains the battery and speakers. The Frame comes with the headset, a spacer for glasses, two controllers with lanyards, the special wireless adapter, a USB Type-C cable, and a cleaning cloth. You don’t get this AC adapter included -- it’s a $30 optional accessory that matches the Deck charger, although any USB power supply will work -- such as the one that comes with a Quest 3. A replacement kit for the stock cushions and rubber nosepiece runs $50, in the event they deteriorate or get nasty over time. The single USB Type-C port is for charging and data (only at USB2 speeds, which is 480 megabits per second). Unlike the Quest 3, the Frame lacks a 3.5mm headphone jack. The Type-C port can be used with 3.5mm adapters. The stock headphones were designed to be lightweight and portable, but an enthusiast headstrap kit will launch in a few months with Index-style headphones and a hot-swappable battery. This will be an add-on kit, not another Frame SKU, so the kit will only include the accessories. Valve has a number of DLC add-ons, like the "Ergonomic Accessories Kit" for $60 US with controller hand straps, a headset top strap, and an extended light blocker. Some of these feel necessary: the hand straps are important for finger tracking since they let you fully open your hands to actually utilize the feature, and the default light blocker may leave a significant open gap depending on your face shape. Patrick found the light blocker accessory unnecessary, while Steve found it necessary due to the extreme amount of light coming in. The optional top strap just got in the way for some of us, but for Steve, it helped with headset bounce when walking, possibly because it helps keep the strap secure over long hair. We think some of Valve’s first-party accessories should be included with the Frame, like the hand straps that are necessary to fully utilize the advertised finger tracking feature beyond taking one or two fingers off the controller. Grab a GN15 Large Anti-Static Modmat to celebrate our 15th Anniversary and for a high-quality PC building work surface. The Modmat features useful PC building diagrams and is anti-static conductive. Purchases directly fund our work! (or consider a direct donation or a Patreon contribution!) Privacy Up next, thanks to our LG deep-dive, we have a new section that we’ve never had in reviews before: a review of the privacy settings, the extent of the devices’ spy capabilities, and the privacy policies. After all, both the Frame and Quest are loaded with cameras, microphones, and motion tracking, and Meta’s involved. Valve Steam Frame Privacy Starting from the checkout: Valve requires users to accept two agreements when purchasing its hardware – Valve’s privacy policy and Steam Subscriber Agreement – totaling a collective 12,616 words. If you have a Steam account, you’ve likely already accepted these. Valve’s privacy policy explains how it collects account data, gaming activity and statistics, device information, transaction/payment data, posts/comments/chats on Steam, interactions on the Steam client, and tracking cookies/pixels, which it claims it uses to provide both its services and content recommendations. Additionally, in a statement to us, Valve clarified: “Camera and eye-tracking data is processed on-device, and we don't collect it, nor do we collect byproducts of it. Steam Support has long had the ability for users to choose to submit a system report to help us troubleshoot problems they may be having. For Steam Frame, that report would contain text logs that include some camera and eye-tracking systems data. As always, Valve never sells user data to third party advertisers.” Meta Quest 3 Privacy Meta’s Quest 3 checkout, on the other hand, has seven user agreements totaling over 36,000 words. That includes Shopify’s terms and privacy policy that Meta attempts getting users to unnecessarily agree to. Then, the Meta Horizon app that Meta claims is required to complete the Quest 3 setup requires users to accept an additional 5 agreements containing 46,579 words, so you’re now at almost 83,000 words of agreements before using the headset. Meta’s App Store page says: “The following data may be collected and linked to your identity: [...] Health & Fitness, Purchases, Financial Info, Location, Contact Info, Contacts, User Content, Search History, Browsing HIstory, Identifiers, Usage Data, Sensitive Info, Diagnostics, and Other Data.” In addition to collecting all the same types of information as Valve, Meta also records and processes all voice interactions using its voice services, “including conversations with AI-powered features” and they say, “including if you mistakenly invoke our voice services, as well as any background sound that happens,” so they’re pulling a full LG but they’ve actually written it a little bit better. Meta claims that voice dictation recordings aren’t stored. Meta also collects all video and audio content you create, including “video or audio content and information about this content, such as the date and time you created it,” and also “environmental information and dimensions,” and what it calls ‘abstracted’: hand and body data, gaze data, facial expressions data, and fit adjustment data. Meta claims that raw image data is processed locally, but says it processes what it calls the "abstracted data" and that it collects and retains certain data collected from those interactions, explaining in its Natural Facial Expressions Privacy Notice: “When you choose to enable Natural Facial Expressions on the headset or in a specific app, software on the Meta Quest Pro headset analyzes images of your face (“raw image data”) to create an estimate of how your face is moving, producing a set of generic facial expressions, like a broad smile or frown, (“abstracted facial expressions data”) that animate your avatar. The raw image data is processed in real time on your headset and deleted once processing is completed. We do not collect or store raw image data from the Natural Facial Expressions feature on Meta servers. The abstracted facial expressions data is generated and overwritten in real time on your headset, and processed on device or Meta servers to animate your avatar’s facial expressions. For example, if you choose to give an app offered by Meta access to your Natural Facial Expressions data, the abstracted facial expressions data may be processed on Meta servers in order to animate your avatar’s facial movement in a multiplayer scenario. Meta notes: “Additionally, when you use Worlds, the last few minutes of your and other users’ most recent audio, video and other interactions in Worlds are recorded in case you want to report anything you’ve encountered. These recordings may be stored on our servers. We do not review these recordings unless you submit a report. If you don't submit a report, the recordings are deleted on a rolling basis.” Meta also assigns users advertising IDs (enabled by default), has significantly more users agreements, and includes a forced arbitration notice in its terms. Valve actually removed its mandatory arbitration clause and class action waiver from its Steam Subscriber Agreement in late 2024 after getting “threatened with an avalanche of individual dispute resolution demands,” as reported via Reuters. In Meta’s “Parent Privacy Disclosure,” the company tells parents what information it collects about their children aged 10-12 years old when using Meta VR products, listing: “audio recordings of your child’s voice” if voice services are enabled “video and audio information recorded when cameras and microphones are enabled” “Physical information about or related to your child,” if hand and body tracking is enabled “Headset location” if location services are enabled “your child’s connections to others” “your child’s activity in Meta Quest devices and apps” (like apps downloaded, gameplay activity and stats, content created as well as the time, frequency, and duration of activities), And, with approval, “the size of walls, surfaces, and objects in your child’s room” We wouldn’t want literally anybody having access to that much of a child’s information, and certainly not a company with Meta’s track record. Only a year ago, two former Meta researchers “studying the welfare of underage users of Meta VR products” told a Senate subcommittee that Meta’s VR products exposed children to adult content and claimed that “Meta disregarded their findings, censored their attempts to do further research and, in at least one instance, deleted evidence of youth being harassed,” as reported via NBC. As for why Meta needs so much of your child’s information, one of the researchers explained, “Children drive profits. If Meta invests more in safety to get kids off of there, engagement goes down, monetization goes down, ad revenue goes down. They need them. They need them young. And we know that younger audiences drive later engagement across many types of products, but Meta’s smart, they know that too. They need them – they need children.” And back to Valve, as we said, it’s the two Steam agreements, they don’t exfiltrate room, object, or body data off-device, and they don’t sell data to third-party advertisers. As far as we can tell, the only time Valve uses data is in optional cases where users submit support tickets, for example, if you complain about eye tracking or head tracking issues or the data that it already uses for your Steam account for things like content recommendations and things that are on the Steam store rather than just the VR headset. So there’s a pretty big difference between the two products and maybe a bit of an explanation as to how Meta can price their headset low. Steam Frame Fit and Ergonomics Out of the box, almost our entire team found the Frame is easier to put on and more comfortable on the face than the Quest 3 (and a massive improvement over the original Vive). Multiple members of our team consider the Frame the most comfortable VR headset they've used. The openness of the nose area on the Frame makes it easier to, for example, drink from a can while using it (versus a Quest 3 with its nose overhang and enclosure); however, some people may find this positive to be the reason light bleeds into the headset, depending on face shape. The comfort and casual nature of the Frame is its biggest advantage over the Quest, but we also haven't tried any ultra-lightweight headsets like the Bigscreen Beyond 2. The face gasket and eye spacer use magnets and the rear cushion uses hook-and-loop patches. The magnets take some getting used to as the face gasket pulls off extremely easily. The stock position of the lenses is potentially in eyelash-brushing-range, meaning that the inner glass gets dirty relatively easily even if not touching it just from eyelash contact, although we couldn’t physically feel it. We left the spacer on even without glasses for this reason. Maximum claimed width for glasses is 140mm, but we were able to squeeze in a pair with arms out to 145mm. We'll cover this in the thermal section but, anecdotally, we didn't feel unpleasantly hot or uncomfortable with the weight and balance of the Frame. There's a very obvious exhaust vent on the top, which we prefer to the hidden cracks on the Quest 3. We managed to overheat a Quest 3 by sticking a label over the wrong joint. For cleaning, Valve says to use their microfiber cloth and water (no chemicals). We found it difficult to keep the lenses clean, although this didn't noticeably affect vision. Steam Frame Thermal Testing We initially attempted thermal testing using thermocouples attached to the face, but abandoned the test due to issues with (1) getting them to stick reliably, and (2) not influencing the results by trapping thermocouples under non-breathable adhesives. We instead switched to a Fluke RSE 600 thermal imaging camera. The process involved playing Moss locally, at equal settings on both devices, for 30 minutes. Then, upon removing the headset, we instantaneously take the thermal measurement of the wearer’s face. This is obviously imperfect due to human factors; however, we controlled as best we could by taking a control measurement, testing in the same ambient temperature, and testing on the same day (with a brief cooldown). The results generally favored the Frame for face skin temperature during use. Within 1/3 of a second of taking the headset off, we captured browline numbers -- which land right underneath the gasket for each headset -- at 5 points. Those had the Frame at 33 degrees to the Quest’s 35 at the hottest point. This is our most useful figure, as the larger gap seems more likely a real impact rather than variance. Browline 2-4 also favored the Frame by about half a degree. The Browline 5 measurement had the Frame at 34.2 to 35.0 of the Quest 3. Eye temperature also ran warmer on the Quest 3, at 34.7-35.1 C versus 33.9-34.2C for the Frame. The Quest 3 ran noticeably warmer on the cheek, right below the eye and at physical contact with the headset. 33.6 is an advantage against the Quest’s 35.1. The nose hotspot was also noticeably higher with the Quest, at 34.6 to 32.8 on the Frame. Given the headset shape, that makes sense. We also captured palm temperature hotspots by holding hands up to the camera immediately after setting the controllers down, but the imperfect nature of this measurement makes it unreliable. The headset lenses ran warmer on the Frame, which indicates to us that its internal ventilation must just be working better than the Quest’s. HMD front external temperatures were also higher on the Frame in areas that don’t contact skin. Testing Intro We have a lot to talk about with controls, the UI, and software, but let’s run through some hard testing numbers first and then come back to those. Latency Methodology Latency testing is next. For this, we’d ideally want the end-to-end latency of the VR system, so in other words, how long it takes from button press on a controller to an action happening on the screen. We used the LDAT for this and attempted to solder wires into a button on the controller so that the LDAT would be aware of a press, but the Steam Frame controllers were difficult to disassemble safely and involve glue. We found that soldering the LDAT to the grip button interfered with its function, and we were worried about breaking the controllers to get into the face buttons. Normally, that’s not a concern. But we only have one of these for testing and the controllers use glue that we can’t easily get at. We also tried a Steam Controller hardwired to the Frame's USB-C port, but we ran into issues there, too. Wiring into a button is ideal because we don’t need to count frames and we can run a 100-sample test for accuracy. Since wiring in a lead didn’t work, we realized we could instead use a microphone. The LDAT microphone hears the button click and starts a timer, then when it sees a change on the monitor (or headset, in this case) it stops the timer. It’s not as fast as the velocity of an electron, but 343 meters per second is fast enough for us. All streaming tests were hosted on our GPU bench with an RTX 5090 and a 9800X3D. The Frame was set to 120Hz since the only higher option (144Hz) is labeled experimental, and 120Hz is also the highest refresh rate supported by the Quest 3 without tweaking. WITH tweaking, the Quest 3 can apparently run at up to 207Hz, or 240Hz with a reduction in resolution. The easiest test would be to stream the regular LDAT test software in theater mode in VR, which works, but 2D streaming and VR streaming are different pipelines in Steam. For example, multi-link streaming doesn't currently work with non-VR games. We did some initial tests anyway out of curiosity, but these numbers don't apply to VR streaming. Latency Benchmarks - LDAT Test Software Here’s the first chart with controlled testing using the LDAT software Vsynced to 120Hz on the PC side, as otherwise it was hit-or-miss whether we’d stream the white frame needed to trigger the LDAT. These tests were done at 1920x1080 with video quality set to the “beautiful” setting, unlimited bandwidth, a 240FPS cap set for Remote Play, and a 350Mbps cap in SteamVR. Inputs were issued by a mouse connected to the host PC, so the controllers aren't part of these numbers. This is control testing. Throughout testing, we recorded three baselines with 100 samples each on the 360Hz monitor, which fell between 24.3ms and 25.6ms. At 120Hz, the Frame over the wireless adapter averaged 46.1ms and the Frame over WiFi averaged 47.1ms. That these figures are so close is an achievement, and the adapter is technically better here. The Quest 3 on WiFi averaged 72.5ms in the same test. The Quest 3 required 57% more time to make the trip as compared to the Frame’s best result. That’s an incredibly strong start for the Steam Frame and a rough one for the Quest, but VR game streaming is the real test. Latency Benchmarks - Thumper We’re using Thumper as a test scenario since it can run natively on both the Frame and Quest as well as streaming. We’re also using it because Thumper has clear actions that are photonically observable. The disclaimer of test limitations is that we're testing one action in one game, so these are not the set-in-stone latency numbers for each device. Here's the chart. Big picture, the Steam Frame’s latency in this specific test is superior to the Quest 3, with the exception of the Steam Frame on WiFi (without the wireless adapter or multi-link). We kept the same 120Hz refresh rates and maxed-out stream settings, since the point of the Frame is supposed to be that it can reliably handle high-quality streaming. Our control test with the monitor measured 24.8 ms. Running Thumper local to the Frame at 120 Hz, we measured a 56.5 ms response time to what the player would see. At 72 Hz, predictably, that got worse (with fewer cycles) and climbed to 61.2 ms. With multi-link streaming from a host, non-local, and at 120 Hz, we measured a 65.7 ms latency. Versus local, this streamed test added 9.2 ms, increasing the time measured by 16%. Using only the wireless adapter pushed that to 68.4 ms, another 2.7 ms (or 4%) on top of multi-link. Multi-Link does seem to be better than just the adapter in at least this specific test, and by a measurable amount. The Quest shows up here: Locally, which uses a different build via the Meta store and may have variance, the response with the default 72 Hz refresh was 75.2 ms. Like-for-like against the 72 Hz Frame locally, that’s about a 23% increase in measured latency versus the 61.2 ms result of the Frame. Running from the host computer rather than locally, we obviously see some slow-down. We opted into the beta version of the Steam Link app on the Quest to get plug-and-play streaming over USB using the cable that shipped with the headset. Assuming the beta feature was working correctly, it didn't have much of an effect and landed at 82.9 ms. That was with the cable that ships with the Quest 3, which isn't good for high transfer speeds and Meta wants to sell you an $80 link cable instead. We did not have one of those to test. With the Quest 3 over WiFi and 120 Hz, we measured 83.5 ms. The Steam Frame on WiFi and 120 Hz ran at 86.2 ms. Keep in mind that specific results for WiFi will depend on your router solution. Our tests were conducted with like-for-like hardware and in the same spot, so the WiFi solution was fixed for all tests. The low-persistence displays of the VR headsets make it hard to use the LDAT since it relies on changes in luminance and the screens are rapidly strobing. You can see this effect easily by filming inside the headset. In the original announcement, Valve told us that the duty cycle for its LCD panels was locked at 8% at all framerates, meaning that, at 120Hz, the panels are illuminated for approximately 0.67ms out of every 8.3ms refresh. This reduces blur, and is part of the reason Valve opted for LCD over OLED. Multi-Link and Foveated Streaming Up next, we’ll explain how foveated streaming and multi-link work. The Frame is presently wireless-only. Valve’s included wireless adapter gives the Frame an advantage over the Quest 3 in households with bad wireless signal strength or old routers. We found the wireless adapter mostly suited to streaming in the same room. Walking about 8 meters away from the test bench and facing directly away made the signal start dropping out, while facing towards the bench set it back to "excellent." It offers decent range but you’d have trouble piercing through walls. The Quest 3's solution to bad WiFi is that it can be used wired. As of August 31st, Valve updated the beta version of the Steam Link app on the Quest to make it plug-and-play. The Frame can connect to normal WiFi, and it can also connect to the included Wireless Adapter: it has two radios. When you connect the Frame to WiFi, it gives the option to reserve its 6E connection specifically for the Wireless Adapter. If you connect the Frame to the Wireless Adapter but not to WiFi, you can still stream games locally through the Wireless Adapter, but your headset won't be connected to the internet. This would isolate your headset away from the internet. The Frame can do multi-link streaming as well with the simultaneous 5GHz WiFi and 6GHz wireless adapter connections. Valve told us: "All of the links are always active and competing for the lowest latency on a per-packet basis, acting as a single robust connection with built-in redundancy that adapts in real-time. This means your streaming connection is always as powerful as the strongest link, and often better than any single link." Foveated streaming is a new concept that Valve has been pushing that utilizes the Frame's eye tracking to prioritize high-bitrate streaming directly in front of your pupils, but there's not much we can do to demonstrate it in video recordings. There's a debug tool to highlight the foveated area that gets the highest-quality stream, so we know it's active, but it's hard to notice by design. Valve says: "The angular size of the foveated area is a function of game resolution and the encoded video size." We kept the encoded video size slider maxed out at its default value of 1344px for everything in this review. Steam Frame Battery Life Grab a GN Soldering & Project Mat for a high-quality work surface with extreme heat resistance. These purchases directly fund our operation, including our build-out of the hemi-anechoic chamber for our acoustic testing! (or consider a direct donation or a Patreon contribution!) Battery life and charge testing is next. Meta doesn't have a battery capacity listed in its technical specs: it just says it should last 2.2 hours overall, or 2.4 when gaming. The most common number is 19.44Wh from an iFixit teardown, but the label on the battery in that video looks like it says 19.12Wh. Either way, it's probably somewhere around 19-20Wh. Valve's battery claim is 21.6Wh, although differences in measurement are always possible. Valve told us that "highly optimized games (and streaming) may use