As Not-E3 season starts to wind down and everyone’s wishlist starts to look crowded with games scheduled for September and October, the next big event on the calendar is Steam Next Fest. The second of three planned week-long demo showcases for 2026, Next Fest is positioned to provide an early taste of upcoming games across a wide variety of genres. The demo showcase has grown in the years since it was first introduced, and the June 2026 edition has ballooned to a truly ridiculous size, with 4,931 demos being featured at the time of writing.
Normally, having too many free game demos to play is a great problem to have, but with Next Fest, the sheer number of participating games feels like overkill. It’s worth noting that the original goal of Next Fest was for each demo to only be available to play for the week of the event, but it’s not unusual to see these early slices of game remain in place long after the Steam event wraps up. It’s also not unusual for these demos to go live before Next Fest even begins, and plenty of these demos have also been around for a while before they got a quick rebranding.
Prepare for some choice paralysis, because the only way to experience everything that Next Fest has to offer would be to forego sleep for a week and work out a way to complete a game demo once every 122 seconds. Or if you really like what you’re sampling off of Steam, you can just replay the same demo for as long as it’s live–or wonder if certain game demos should even be eligible.
Beyond Next Fest, several more Steam events have been dated for June and beyond. The Steam Summer Sale kicks off on June 25 and runs through July 9. Choo-choo fans can check out Train Fest starting July 20, and Cyberpunk Fest is shining a spotlight on neon-soaked sci-fi games. Later in the year, the Steam Autumn Sale will run for one week starting October 1, and the Steam Winter Sale is scheduled to start on December 17.