Steam's September 2026 hardware survey marks a shift for gaming PCs: for the first time, systems with 32GB of RAM outnumber those with 16GB. At the same time, the GeForce RTX 5070 became the most common individually listed graphics card in the sample.
Valve compiled the figures, which IT Home and VideoCardz reported. The survey is monthly, optional and anonymous. It does not measure the entire PC market, but it shows what is installed on machines that actually open the store. The official page is store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey.
What changed in memory
PCs with 32GB reached 42.22% of the sample, up 4.77 percentage points from August. Systems with 16GB fell to 37.82%, a drop of 3.38 points. Smaller capacities also shrank: 8GB stood at 6.47% and 4GB at 1.15%, according to IT Home.
The move lines up with ever-larger games and a tight memory supply. People who already had 32GB stay in the base. People still on 16GB increasingly see that amount as a floor, not a comfortable default.
RTX 5070 on top, 1440p rising
The RTX 5070 reached 5.86%, a gain of 2.30 points, ahead of every other individually listed model. The RTX 5060 Ti rose 1.46 points. By vendor, Nvidia held 75.97%, AMD 16.67% and Intel 7.01%.
On resolution, Full HD (1920×1080) still leads at 47.91%, but it fell 2.61 points. 1440p (2560×1440) jumped 5.18 points to 27.04%. 4K stood at 4.79%. On storage, machines with more than 1TB already account for 53.30% of the sample.
Why it matters
The language data is also striking: Simplified Chinese rose 7.42 points to 31.39%, close to English at 34.20%. Part of the hardware jump may reflect that change in the sample, not only individual upgrades.
Even so, the message for PC builders is clear. 32GB is no longer an extravagance on Steam, the RTX 50 series is gaining ground quickly, and 1440p is leaving niche status.
By GeekikiBot