Steam On Your Chromebook

 Play Steam Games On Chromebook

When we hear gaming, most of the time in our mind comes Steam. Unfortunately for a long time, steam wasn't an option for Chromebooks, but it changed recently. Right now there are many ways to get Steam on your Chromebooks, and I will cover some here. Just to let you know that most of these methods probably won't run for AMR-based Chromebooks.

Method 1
ChromeOS Beta Steam

Google actually team up with steam and made officially steam support on some Chromebooks. Not all Chromebooks can run steam in this method and also you need to be on the ChromeOS Dev channel. So this is the list of Chromebooks that can run Steam. If you see your Chromebook in the list below, then you are in luck. To learn how to install it and get more information then follow this link 

• Acer Chromebook 514 (CB514-1W)
• Acer Chromebook 515 (CB515-1W)
• Acer Chromebook 516 GE
• Acer Chromebook Spin 514 (CP514-3H, CP514-3HH, CP514-3WH)
• Acer Chromebook Spin 713 (CP713-3W)
• Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (CP714-1WN)
• Acer Chromebook Vero 514
• ASUS Chromebook CX9 (CX9400)
• ASUS Chromebook Flip CX5 (CX5500)
• ASUS Chromebook Flip CX5 (CX5601)
• ASUS Chromebook Vibe CX55 Flip
• Framework Laptop Chromebook Edition
• HP Elite c640 14 inch G3 Chromebook
• HP Elite c645 G2 Chromebook
• HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook
• HP Pro c640 G2 Chromebook
• IdeaPad Gaming Chromebook 16
• Lenovo 5i-14 Chromebook
• Lenovo Flex 5i Chromebook 14
• Lenovo ThinkPad C14

Method 2
Steam Link

If method one is confusing or your Chromebook is not on the list, then this method is probably the easiest way to play steam on ChromeOS. Steam link is an app that let you pair your Chromebook or android device to a Computer where you have steam and through that, you can play your games. It's kind of like mirroring your PC stream. You need a good connection for this one. Steam link is available on Play Store for free.

To download the app press here

Method 3
Linux App

Now that Chromebooks can support Linux, you can actually get steam through the Linux apps. For this method, though you need to activate Linux on your Chromebook through your Chrome OS setting.

Turn on Linux

• Select Chromebook Settings 
• Go to Advanced and then Developers.
• Next to "Linux development environment," select Turn On.
• Follow the on-screen instructions. Setup can take a few minutes.
• A terminal window opens. You can run Linux commands, install more tools using the APT package manager, and customize your shell.

To turn off Linux (in case you changed your mind)

• At the bottom right, select the time.
• Select Settings and then Advanced and then Developers and then Linux development environment.
• Under "Remove Linux development environment," select Remove.

After you turn on Linux

For non-ARM devices.

• First, you need to enable some flag, type this link on your browser 

chrome://flags/#exo-pointer-lock   then enable the pointer lock flag.

• Now open the Linux terminal. It's under the terminal on your Chromebook menu.
• Copy the link below to the terminal. 

/usr/bin/curl -L https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromiumos/platform/dev-util/+/master/contrib/gfx/crostini-steam-setup.sh?format=TEXT" | /usr/bin/base64 -d > /tmp/crostini-steam-setup.sh; /bin/chmod a+x /tmp/crostini-steam-setup.sh; /usr/bin/sudo /tmp/crostini-steam-setup.sh

The copying method is a little bit different. You need to click with two fingers on the mouse pad and paste it to the terminal.

Now you should be able to see the steam app on your Chromebook. You might need to update your Linux package.

Conclusion

There are more ways to get Steam on your Chromebooks. I will try my best to keep updating this post with new information.