If you have been holding off buying PC games until Steam's Black Friday sale, there is some bad news: there is not going to be one. Valve's Steam Autumn Sale, which used to land around late November, ran from 1 to 8 October this year. Black Friday falls on Friday 27 November 2026, and Valve's own event calendar shows no Steam-wide seasonal sale that week.
Forge PC has not been briefed by Valve. This piece is based on Valve's Steamworks "Upcoming Steam Events" page, which lists the dates Valve gives to developers, plus reporting from GG.deals and PC Gamer. All dates are as listed on 13 November 2026.
What Valve's calendar actually shows
Valve runs four Steam-wide seasonal sales a year. Its Steamworks page, read on 13 November 2026, lists the next ones as:
Event | Dates (per Valve) |
|---|
Auto-Battler RPG Fest (themed) | 16 to 23 November 2026 |
Steam Winter Sale 2026 | 17 December 2026 to 4 January 2027 |
Spring Sale 2027 | 18 to 25 March 2027 |
Summer Sale 2027 | 24 June to 8 July 2027 |
Autumn Sale 2027 | To be confirmed |
The only official event near Black Friday is the Auto-Battler RPG Fest, which spotlights one genre rather than the whole store. It ends on 23 November, four days before Black Friday itself.
Why the Autumn Sale moved
Valve has not published a detailed reason on the Steamworks page. What is documented is the change in timing: PC Gamer's sale calendar lists the 2026 Autumn Sale as 1 to 8 October, and GG.deals reports that because it has already run, "there is officially no Steam Black Friday Sale planned for 2026."
The practical effect is simple. If you skipped the October sale expecting a November one, the next Steam-wide discount event is the Winter Sale from 17 December.
Will there be any Steam deals on Black Friday?
Probably some, but not as a single Valve event. GG.deals notes that individual publishers can still run their own discounts around 27 November, and Steam has weekly deals and publisher sales throughout the year. Those are decided game by game, so there is no way to know in advance which titles will be cut.
Other PC stores are not bound by Valve's calendar. Retailers selling Steam keys and rival launchers often run Black Friday promotions, but we have not seen confirmed 2026 dates or discounts from them, so we are not listing any here.
What this means for UK PC gamers
Do not hold a wishlist purchase for Black Friday on Steam alone. If a game you want is already discounted, that is the deal you know about.
Use the Steam wishlist. Steam emails you when a wishlisted game goes on sale, which catches publisher sales you would otherwise miss.
Plan for 17 December. The Winter Sale is the next store-wide event, and Valve says any game released at least 30 days before it can take part with a discount.
Think about hardware separately. Black Friday is still a big week for PC parts. Our Black Friday 2026 UK PC parts guide and UK GPU and CPU price watch cover what is worth watching, and DDR5 prices remain high going into the sales.
If you are buying a new PC to play your backlog, our Windows 11 gaming settings guide and performance checklist are worth a look before you install anything.
Our verdict
There is no Steam-wide Black Friday sale in 2026. Valve's Autumn Sale already ran from 1 to 8 October, and its own calendar shows only a themed Auto-Battler RPG Fest (16 to 23 November) before the Winter Sale on 17 December. Expect scattered publisher discounts around 27 November, use your wishlist alerts, and save the big shop for December. We have not spoken to Valve; dates come from Valve's Steamworks calendar, with reporting from GG.deals and PC Gamer.
