Steam Direct fee: the charge for each new app

The Steam Direct fee is Valve's $100.00 charge per new Steam app. It is not refundable, but Valve pays it back after the app earns $1,000.00 in adjusted gross revenue. The payback shows as its own line in the monthly report, so a game that never reaches $1,000.00 keeps the fee as a cost of release.

Last reviewed · SteamStats team

What Steamworks says

The Steam Direct Fee is not refundable
Steamworks: Steam Direct app fee
  • The fee is $100.00, or the equivalent, for each new app.
  • It is recouped once the app reaches $1,000.00 of adjusted gross revenue from the Steam Store and in-app purchases, in the payment after that point.
  • The recoupment appears as a separate line item in the monthly report.
  • Only users with Admin permissions in an existing Steamworks partner can pay the fee, and the app credit it buys can only be activated by the person who paid.
  • Valve adds VAT, GST or a similar consumption tax to the fee where the payer's country requires it, and the invoice is issued to the individual user who paid.
  • If the fee payment is charged back, Valve may withhold both the sales revenue and the repayment of the fee.
  • A new partner completes a set of digital paperwork before paying, as part of joining Steamworks.

Why it matters

For most games the fee is a deposit rather than a cost: it comes back once sales pass $1,000.00. A very small release, a free game without in-app purchases or a game that sells less than expected keeps it as a cost.

The fee is not the payment minimum. Separately, Valve may hold a monthly payment until at least $100.00 is owed, because each payment and the receiving bank's fees cost money. The two amounts happen to match and are easy to mix up.

Example: when Pebblewick earns the fee back

Illustrative inputs for Pebblewick, the fictional demo game by Hollow Fern Games: one app credit paid for $100.00 before release, and adjusted gross revenue of $180.00, $240.00, $310.00, $270.00 in its first four days on sale.

Pebblewick: adjusted gross revenue against the $1,000.00 threshold
Day on saleAdjusted gross that dayRunning totalThreshold reached
Day 1$180.00$180.00No
Day 2$240.00$420.00No
Day 3$310.00$730.00No
Day 4$270.00$1,000.00Yes

Pebblewick passes $1,000.00 on day 4. The $100.00 does not come off any sales figure: it returns as its own line in a later monthly report, next to the sales, after the threshold has been passed.

Where SteamStats shows it

SteamStats builds gross and net revenue from the sales in the Steamworks sales report and does not track the fee or its payback. The Money view dates each monthly payout from those sales; the fee comes back as a separate line that Valve adds to one of those payments.

  • Payout month: The calendar month of sales that one Steam payment covers. Valve pays each month's sales by the 30th of the following month.
  • US share: The part of a Steam payment earned on sales made in the United States. US withholding, where it applies, is calculated on this part only.
  • US withholding: US withholding is the tax Valve holds back from the part of a non-US developer's Steam payment earned on US sales, at a rate between 0.00% and 30.00%.
  • VAT: VAT on Steam is the consumption tax included in a player's price in countries where Valve collects it. Valve remits it to tax authorities; it is not developer revenue.

Sources