Does Fallout 76 work on Steam Deck? (Best Settings)

Fallout 76 is seeing a resurgence in players due to the Fallout TV show, which means many people (myself included) are curious if the game can run on a Steam Deck and, if so, what the best settings are. Here's how to ensure that your game runs smoothly on your Steam Deck.

Can Fallout 76 run on the Steam Deck?

When looking at Fallout 76's Steam Page, the game is shown as "playable." This means that the game should run on any Steam Deck, but it might have a few issues. For example, the page mentions that you may need to pull up the virtual keyboard to type, or you may have trouble reading the text on the screen.

Overall, it seems that the game should run on the Steam Deck without game-breaking issues. I haven't had any problems with the game so far, but I haven't played with other players, so I haven't needed the keyboard much at all. In fact, I have enjoyed the game on the Steam Deck more than on my PlayStation, just because I can play it wherever without sacrificing much.

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Best settings for Fallout 76 on the Steam Deck

Honestly, the game runs great without changing any major settings. I only changed the in-game settings for certain graphics, and it worked well. If you don't care about the battery, you can raise your settings (everything on medium settings) and keep around 60 FPS. The downside of keeping settings at medium is that you will drain your battery fast; my OLED lasted a little over two hours at these settings.

However, most players will want to sacrifice a little graphical fidelity to save on battery. I added about an hour to my gameplay by dropping the graphics, making it worth it in the long run. If you do this, you will still hover around 45 FPS, which seems to be enough to play the game properly. In order to meet this, you will want to set the following settings:

• Resolution: 1280x800
• Texture Quality: Medium
• Water Quality: Low
• Lighting Quality: Medium
• Shadow Quality: Low
• Shadow Distance: Low

Truthfully, the game runs extremely well for a modern MMO that isn't labeled as "compatible" by Steam. It is one of those games that I don't have to tinker with much to get up and running, which makes it more than playable on Steam Deck in my opinion.

For more help with Fallout 76, check out All Fallout 76 Merchant Locations and Inventories (Map) and All Fallout 76 Gulper Locations (Map).