Steam is arguably the most popular game distribution platform right now.
You can buy different games and softwares from there, and then access them across multiple devices. You can even share those game with your friends and family.
But actually, there’s one area where steam is truly disappointing, and that’s its overall speed. As you may have already realized, steam can be frustratingly slow sometimes.
That’s why in this post we’ll discuss different ways you can speed up different areas of steam, and here we go.
How to Speed Up Steam’s Built-in Web Browser
Steam has a built-in web browser that enables users to access the internet directly within games, via steam’s in-game overlay. But before you feel excited about it, let me tell you one thing.
It’s not your chrome or Firefox browser.
It’s slower than most of the web browsers out there, and there’s a noticeable lag every time you go to a new page.
But there’s a technique that enables this browser to compete with the big boys, and that’s hidden in “internet options” of your control panel. Below is the step-by-step procedure on how to do it.
Go to the start menu, enter internet options, and click its shortcut.
Once you’re in the internet options window, click on Connections Tab, and then LAN settings in that Tab.
In the newly-opened window of LAN settings, uncheck against the “Automatically Detect Settings” label. After this, Click OK.
Now whenever you’ll use steam’s built-in browser, you’ll notice a decent speed improvement. One thing worth mentioning here is that the above changes can cause some network issues for some users. If that happens, you need to re-enable “Automatically Detect Settings” options.
How to Speed Up Steam’s Downloading
Downloading speed is another area where steam is not the best choice. Speeds are often less than what they should be been.
It’s because, whenever you download a game, steam automatically detects nearest downloading server to your location. Often times, though, this automatic detection is not perfect.
On top of that, there’s a chance that nearest servers from your location are under heavy load due to seasonal sales and game launches.
In this case, you can really increase your download speed by choosing a less-populated server. Here’s how you can change your server.
- Open steam settings by clicking on Steam menu, and selecting settings option from that drop-down menu.
- Once you’re in the settings area, you’ll see a lot of options on the left side of the screen, such as Friends, Interface, Cloud etc.
- You need to select Download from that options-list.
- After clicking on the Downloads tab, you’ll see some downloading preferences on the right.
- You need to change your Download Region, and make sure to set “Limit Bandwidth to” option to “No Limit”.
After this, you should restart steam and try downloading some games. Your downloading speed should have been improved by now.
To be frank, it’s a bit of trial and error approach, and you may not find an optimal server until after a few tries.