Game devs still think Steam doesn't justify its 30% sales cut

A new GDC 2020 survey shows developers still don't agree with Steam's 70-30 revenue split.

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Unless your game makes millions of dollars, Steam keeps 30% of all sales revenues for everything sold on the platform and developers pull in 70%. This number is further dissected when publishers are involved.

According to the latest GDC State of the Industry survey, most developers think Steam's 30% cut is quite archaic. Roughly 25% of respondents, or 1,000 developers, think Steam's revenue split should be 85-15 in their favor. This is the same split the Epic Games Store offers devs.

10% of them, or 400 devs, agree with Valve taking home 21% of revenues. Just 6%, or 240 developers, think Steam's current revenue split is fair. These numbers reflect last year's survey which basically delivered similar results.

Steam is still the storefront that game devs make most of their money. 34% of respondents, or roughly 1,360 people, say they've made over 75% of their sales revenues on Steam. Given this, it's easy to see why they'd want a better cut.

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