Valve Faces £656m UK Lawsuit Over Steam Pricing Practices

Valve Corporation has been ordered to face a £656 million lawsuit in the United Kingdom after the Competition Appeal Tribunal ruled that the case could proceed, opening the door for up to 14 million Steam users in the country to potentially receive compensation.

The lawsuit was first filed in June 2024 by digital rights activist Vicki Shotbolt, who accused Valve of manipulating the PC games market through "restrictive practices" on its Steam platform.

Shotbolt argued that Valve imposed "price parity clauses" on publishers and developers, preventing them from offering lower prices on rival platforms. This, she claimed, limited consumer choice and stifled competition.

She further alleged that Valve’s decision to prohibit players from purchasing downloadable content (DLC) for Steam games on other platforms effectively "locked" users into Steam’s ecosystem.

Combined with an “excessive commission of up to 30%,” Shotbolt said these practices led to “inflated prices on its Steam,” leaving UK gamers paying more than they should.

Valve initially pushed back against the case, arguing that it should not be certified to proceed toward a trial. However, the Competition Appeal Tribunal disagreed with this assessment. The tribunal held a hearing in October 2025 to consider the application for a collective proceedings order, and their judgment, issued on January 26, 2026, granted the request. This means the case will now move forward through the legal system.

The lawsuit is being handled by Milberg London LLP, a legal firm that specializes in group action cases against large corporations. The firm previously took on Sony in a similar case back in 2022, where the company was accused of abusing its market power.

For this particular case, Shotbolt has secured over £18.6 million in funding to support the legal proceedings, though Valve did attempt to challenge these funding arrangements as part of their effort to halt the case.

If Shotbolt succeeds in her legal battle, the 14 million affected Steam users in the UK could receive compensation. The lawsuit estimates that each person might be entitled to between £22 and £44, with the breakdown being approximately £8 to £23 for game purchases and £14 to £29 for add-on content. The collective action claim covers purchases made since 2018, encompassing both games and additional content bought through Steam or other platforms.

This isn't the only legal trouble Valve is facing over similar issues. Overgrowth developer Wolfire Studios filed an antitrust case against Valve in April 2021, focusing on the platform's 30% revenue cut, which they described as "extraordinarily high." That case was initially dismissed but was later refiled with modified arguments. VR game developer Dark Catt Studios also filed a lawsuit in June 2021, and both cases were eventually combined into one in late 2024.

Valve is also dealing with a separate consumer lawsuit in the United States, filed in Seattle in August 2024, claiming the company’s market dominance and massive annual revenue stem from “strangling competition” through price restraints.