Can the Quest Play Steam Games?
Ordinarily, the only games your Quest or Quest 2 (which from here on out we’ll refer to as the Quest) can download and play are the ones in the official Store, which you generally access from the VR environment in your headset.
A feature called Oculus Link lets you “tether” your Quest to a computer via a USB cable in much the same way that PCVR headsets like the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift connect. When in Oculus Link mode, the Quest can play any VR games installed in your Steam library, giving you access to a whole new source.
How to Set Up Your Meta (Oculus) Quest to Play SteamVR Games
Before installing software, make sure you have a USB cable you can use with your Quest. It’ll need to be long enough to allow you to move around your play area near your PC, so Oculus recommends one at least 10 feet long, and even that is too short to be practical unless you stay relatively motionless.
Meta recommends its official Oculus Link cable, a 15-foot USB-C cable that sells for $79. If you don’t want to spend that much money, you can start with the USB-C cable that comes in the box with your Quest since it works just fine. Or you can look for alternative USB-A or USB-C cables.
Be sure that your Oculus desktop software is installed and configured on your computer. If you are already using your Quest, you probably already installed this software, which gives you access to the Oculus Store and other Quest features. If it’s not already set up, install Steam on your computer as well. When it’s installed, and you’ve logged into your Steam account, install SteamVR. After all the software is installed, plug your Oculus Link USB cable into your Quest and plug the other end into an available port on your PC. After the Quest and your PC negotiate a connection, you should see a pop-up on your PC requesting permission to enable Oculus Link. Click Continue. On your headset, select Enable Oculus Link. You can now start Steam VR in two ways. You can choose to run SteamVR from your app library in the headset, or you can run SteamVR from the computer desktop. Either way, SteamVR should start, and you will find yourself in the SteamVR portal, where you can select any installed games to play.
