Steam Deck OLED: SteamOS 3.8.20 Beta (GPU Driver 26.1.2) vs Stable 3.8.11 in 4 Games

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Valve's SteamOS 3.8.20 beta brings a major graphics driver release and some other improvements, so I wanted to test it side by side like we do with the bigger updates. There's been a lot of SteamOS activity lately with the Steam Machine in its launch phase, and this beta is one of the bigger ones for the Steam Deck. I ran Cyberpunk 2077, Doom: The Dark Ages, Crimson Desert and 007 First Light on my Steam Deck OLED, stable channel on the left and beta on the right.

What's in SteamOS 3.8.20 beta

Valve's notes for the SteamOS 3.8.20 beta (June 29, 2026) list an updated Mesa graphics driver to a new major release, with many ray tracing performance improvements plus other performance and functionality improvements, and greatly improved VRAM management, improving performance and stability in cases where VRAM is limited. That's a lot of games these days, especially with the Steam Deck's 16GB of shared memory. The beta also includes the fixes that went to the stable channel as 3.8.12.

To get it, switch to the Beta update channel in Settings, System, System Update Channel.

Test setup

• Steam Deck OLED (AMD Custom APU 0932)
• Left: stable channel, SteamOS 3.8.11, GPU driver 25.3.0
• Right: beta channel, SteamOS 3.8.20, GPU driver 26.1.2
• Four games in this order: Cyberpunk 2077, Doom: The Dark Ages, Crimson Desert and 007 First Light
• Readings from the Gamescope performance overlay in the video, checked every two seconds at the same moments on both sides. Steam Deck at its standard 15W.

Cyberpunk 2077

Cyberpunk's built-in benchmark came out basically even:

In gameplay after the benchmark, the overlay read 40–49 FPS on stable (with one dip to 21) and 38–50 FPS on the beta, mostly within a frame or two of each other. RAM use was close here, around 7.2 to 7.4GB on stable vs 7.1 to 7.2GB on the beta.

Doom: The Dark Ages

Doom's performance summary after the same run (1280x800) showed a small gain on the beta, and a much better minimum:

In gameplay the overlay read 33–40 FPS on stable and 34–41 FPS on the beta. RAM use was lower on the beta, around 7.6GB vs 8.7 to 9.3GB on stable.

Crimson Desert

Crimson Desert is the heaviest of the four. The overlay read 23–34 FPS on stable and 24–34 FPS on the beta, so frame rates trade back and forth. RAM use is where the beta stood out: around 6.5 to 6.9GB vs 8.4 to 8.6GB on stable.

007 First Light

007 First Light ran about the same on both: 27–46 FPS on stable and 26–45 FPS on the beta in the overlay, with RAM a little lower on the beta (around 7.9 to 8.2GB vs 8.2 to 8.4GB).

Verdict

Nothing major has changed, and I'm not sitting here touting big gains. Still, there's something happening with how the system uses its resources, especially the lower overall RAM use in the latter three games, and that should help in some games. Every game is going to be a little different with this kind of thing. Since Valve called this a major update in the beta channel, it was worth checking, and there are usually more updates and improvements by the time it reaches stable.