A Steam streaming OS for your gaming PC
Leave the heat in the other room.
VaporOS turns a PC with an AMD GPU into a headless Steam box. It runs hot where it stands while you play on your TV, phone or laptop with Moonlight. You set it up and run it from your phone. No terminal, ever.A headless Steam box for a PC with an AMD GPU. Play on your TV, phone or laptop with Moonlight, and run it all from your phone.
- Built on CachyOS
- Signed A/B updates
- Wakes from Moonlight
Every screen gets its own picture.
No dummy plug. When Moonlight starts a stream, VaporOS switches its virtual display to that device's resolution, refresh rate and HDR. The TV gets 4K HDR; your phone gets its own odd shape.
Heat here is pixels per second. The more a device asks for, the harder the GPU works for it.
- Steamin gamescope
- Virtual displayyour device's mode
- SunshineGPU encode
- Home network
- Moonlighton the screen in front of you
Your console, in your pocket.
Open vapor.local on your phone and everything is there. The screen on the PC, if you have one, just tells you where to go.
- Home
- Whether it's ready to stream and what it's doing, with Pair, Stay awake and Power one tap away.
- Devices
- Pair Moonlight with a 4-digit PIN, and see who is playing.
- Screen
- Resolutions learned from each device, HDR and the stream quality.
- System
- Signed updates with a rollback to the previous version, idle power-off and Wake-on-LAN, and game drives VaporOS adds to Steam's library list.
The real thing, on made-up data.
This is the control center itself, running in your browser with a pretend PC behind it. Start a stream, pair a Steam Deck or install an update: nothing here reaches a real PC.
Starting the demo…
Make something happen
Each button plays a moment on the pretend PC. Watch the phone.
The Living room TV starts streaming Steam at 3840 × 2160, 60 Hz, HDR.
A Steam Deck asks to pair. Moonlight shows the PIN; type it on the phone.
A newer version turns up. Download it on the phone, then restart.
Nothing is pairing. Press “A device wants to pair” to start.
The PC powers off. The phone notices within seconds and shows how to wake it.
Back to an idle PC, ready to stream.
What’s real, what’s made up
Real: the control center’s pages, words and behaviour, the same files the PC serves.
Made up: the PC behind them. Its names, addresses and versions are invented, and nothing you type leaves this page.
Three steps. The last one is on your phone.
Once the PC boots from the USB stick, the rest happens in your phone's browser. The PC itself only shows where to go.
Flash a USB stick
Download the ISO and write it to a USB stick with balenaEtcher, Rufus or
dd, or copy it onto a Ventoy stick.Boot the PC from it
Start in UEFI mode with Secure Boot off. The screen shows an address, a QR code and a setup code.
Finish on your phone
Scan the code, pick a drive, set a password, and install. Then pair Moonlight at
vapor.local.
vaporos-setup.local on your phone.Updates that undo themselves.
VaporOS keeps two copies of the system. A new version goes to the copy you aren't running and starts on the next restart. If it doesn't start cleanly, the PC goes back to the previous version by itself, and won't install that version again.
Signed and checked. Every update carries an ed25519 signature, checked before anything is written, and each file is verified before the new version can start. The system itself is read-only.
Slot A runs 20260929.172712. Slot B keeps 20260927.190212.
RunningA
20260929.172712
Running since yesterday
PreviousB
20260927.190212
Kept as it was
Off when nobody plays. On when you do.
When the PC's wired network adapter supports Wake-on-LAN, VaporOS powers off after 15 minutes of nobody playing. Never while you stream, play, download or update. In Moonlight, pick the PC and choose Wake, and it's back. Some PCs need Wake-on-LAN turned on in the firmware first.
Moonlight wakes it
In Moonlight, pick the PC and choose Wake. Any Wake-on-LAN app works too, with the MAC address on the Wake it card under System › Power.
Never mid-game
It never powers off while you stream, play, download or update.
Stay awake
Keep it on for 1 or 4 hours whenever you want it on anyway, or turn idle power-off off under System › Power.
Turn it into a console tonight.
One ISO. Write it to a USB stick, boot the PC from it, and finish the setup on your phone. An installed PC updates itself, so you only download this once.
- AMD Radeon GPU
- x86-64-v3 CPU
- UEFI, Secure Boot off
- 24.5 GiB drive
- Network cable
- USB stick (screen optional)
Good to know
Does it work with NVIDIA or Intel graphics?
Not yet. VaporOS streams with AMD Radeon GPUs on the amdgpu driver. On other graphics it still installs and runs, but the control center's Home and the welcome screen say there's no supported graphics card, and it won't stream. Very old AMD cards that use the legacy radeon driver aren't supported either.
Do I need a monitor? Can I use one?
Not even to install, if the PC already boots from the USB stick in UEFI mode with Secure Boot off: with no monitor connected, the installer skips the setup code. A monitor or TV makes the firmware settings and the code easy.
After that you don't need one. VaporOS makes its own virtual display at the resolution, frame rate and HDR setting of the device you stream to, so you don't need a dummy plug either.
If a monitor is connected, it only ever shows the welcome screen: the address of the PC, a QR code, and a status line such as “Ready to stream”. It never shows a terminal or a desktop.
Can I install it without a monitor?
Yes, if the PC already boots from the USB stick in UEFI mode with Secure Boot off. With no monitor connected, the installer doesn't ask for the setup code: open http://vaporos-setup.local on your phone. Anyone on your network could open it while it waits, so do this on a network you trust.
If the PC's graphics card isn't recognised yet, the installer still asks for the code, which a monitor shows.
What if an update breaks something?
VaporOS keeps two copies of the system. An update goes to the one you aren't running, and the old one stays as it was. If the new version doesn't start cleanly, the PC goes back to the previous version by itself and won't install that version again.
You can also go back by hand: open System › Updates, choose Go back, and restart. VaporOS then holds back the version you left: it won't install it again by itself, only a newer one.
Can I wake it from my phone?
Yes, when the PC is on a network cable and Wake-on-LAN works. In Moonlight, pick the PC and choose Wake; this works for a PC Moonlight has paired with.
Any Wake-on-LAN app on the same network works too, with the MAC address and the broadcast address on the Wake it card under System › Power. Save them while the PC is on.
The VaporOS web page itself can't wake the PC: the PC serves that page, and a web page can't send the wake packet. If the PC goes to sleep while the page is open, the page says how to wake it and reconnects by itself once it's back.
Can I dual boot it with Windows?
No. VaporOS installs to a whole drive and erases it. Other drives in the PC are left alone, and if they hold Steam libraries you can pick them during setup (or later, under System › Storage) and keep playing those games. Nothing on them is changed.