Can’t have anything in 2026—Steam is killing physical gift cards because, you’ve guessed it, scammers

All good things must come to an end, not necessarily due to the natural course of things, but due to total assholes roaming the world and ruining the fun for the rest of us. Now, due to scammers increasingly using physical Steam gift cards for their nefarious deeds, Valve is going to kill them off altogether. This is according to SteamDB on X, which spotted a new clause on Valve’s Steam Wallet explanation page where the company officially announced the end of physical Steam gift cards due to scammers adapting to every restriction the company put into place to protect its own customers, as well as unassuming victims of scams. “We introduced Steam Gift Cards to retail stores back in 2012 and added the digital program in 2017. Unfortunately, scammers use gift cards from major brands like Steam to take advantage of all people all over the world,” Valve wrote. https://embeds.beehiiv.com/a8d62108-86ed-4039-bf49-44877ba62c15 Valve had a robust gift card system in place for years, but it will soon be digital-only. Image via Steam “As we have continued to put more and more restrictions in place, scammers have adapted. They continue to have an impact on Steam customers and other unsuspecting individuals. So we’ve made the difficult decision to end the Steam Gift Card program at retail stores,” the post continues. Valve explained the different measures it implemented to try to save physical gift cards and make them less viable for scammers to use as part of their schemes, including actively working with retailers, law enforcement, adding scam warnings to the cards themselves, limiting their availability and currency-locking them and so on. However, none of these were enough to ward off predatory scammers who work around the clock to invent new ways of draining money from unsuspecting, usually older and less tech-savvy, people. Valve is going to stop restocking physical Steam gift cards and expects to see them disappear from all stores by the end of this year. That isn’t to say digital Steam gift cards are going away, too, as Valve is actively working on preserving and even improving them in light of this unfortunate move. The disappearance of physical items in the video game industry is a sad thing indeed, and whenever anything of this sort happens, I just start feeling really somber as I’m looking at an entire reality of my upbringing slowly receding into the shadows. Everything is digital now, all of existence is online. Sooner or later, discs and physical copies of video games will be phased out, too, and we’ve already been seeing that in effect for the past few years, as even buying an actual box doesn’t guarantee you’ll get a disc and often ends up being just a digital redemption code with extra steps. 0 The post Can’t have anything in 2026—Steam is killing physical gift cards because, you’ve guessed it, scammers appeared first on Destructoid.

Jun 11, 2026 - 03:59

Can’t have anything in 2026—Steam is killing physical gift cards because, you’ve guessed it, scammers

All good things must come to an end, not necessarily due to the natural course of things, but due to total assholes roaming the world and ruining the fun for the rest of us. Now, due to scammers increasingly using physical Steam gift cards for their nefarious deeds, Valve is going to kill them off altogether.

This is according to SteamDB on X, which spotted a new clause on Valve’s Steam Wallet explanation page where the company officially announced the end of physical Steam gift cards due to scammers adapting to every restriction the company put into place to protect its own customers, as well as unassuming victims of scams.

“We introduced Steam Gift Cards to retail stores back in 2012 and added the digital program in 2017. Unfortunately, scammers use gift cards from major brands like Steam to take advantage of all people all over the world,” Valve wrote.

https://embeds.beehiiv.com/a8d62108-86ed-4039-bf49-44877ba62c15

Valve had a robust gift card system in place for years, but it will soon be digital-only. Image via Steam “As we have continued to put more and more restrictions in place, scammers have adapted. They continue to have an impact on Steam customers and other unsuspecting individuals. So we’ve made the difficult decision to end the Steam Gift Card program at retail stores,” the post continues.

Valve explained the different measures it implemented to try to save physical gift cards and make them less viable for scammers to use as part of their schemes, including actively working with retailers, law enforcement, adding scam warnings to the cards themselves, limiting their availability and currency-locking them and so on.

However, none of these were enough to ward off predatory scammers who work around the clock to invent new ways of draining money from unsuspecting, usually older and less tech-savvy, people.

Valve is going to stop restocking physical Steam gift cards and expects to see them disappear from all stores by the end of this year. That isn’t to say digital Steam gift cards are going away, too, as Valve is actively working on preserving and even improving them in light of this unfortunate move.

The disappearance of physical items in the video game industry is a sad thing indeed, and whenever anything of this sort happens, I just start feeling really somber as I’m looking at an entire reality of my upbringing slowly receding into the shadows.

Everything is digital now, all of existence is online. Sooner or later, discs and physical copies of video games will be phased out, too, and we’ve already been seeing that in effect for the past few years, as even buying an actual box doesn’t guarantee you’ll get a disc and often ends up being just a digital redemption code with extra steps.

0 The post Can’t have anything in 2026—Steam is killing physical gift cards because, you’ve guessed it, scammers appeared first on Destructoid.

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