What the Steam Deck Checklist Monthly Actually Is
It isn't a Valve product. It's a community habit that grew out of the Steam Deck's early days when people kept running into the same problems — storage filling up, controller drift creeping in, updates bricking saves. Someone put together a list of things to check once a month and called it the Steam Deck Checklist Monthly. It stuck because it works. The checklist is basically a set of maintenance tasks you run through on the first weekend of each month. Not every single task takes time, but going through them systematically catches issues before they become "my game won't launch" emergencies at 2am. Here's how I use mine.
How to Run the Steam Deck Checklist Monthly (For Real)
Storage Check
Go to Settings Storage. If you're under 5GB free, you're already behind. The Deck throttles write speeds when storage is near full, which makes games load slower than they should. Move a game to external SD card, not delete it. Delete only games you haven't touched in 90 days. This took me about 8 minutes last month when I found 1.2GB of orphaned update files from games I'd already finished. Settings Controller Calibrate. If the left stick reports movement when you're not touching it, you have drift. The fix isn't always recalibration. Sometimes it's cleaning around the potentiometer with 99% isopropyl alcohol and a cotton swab. I spent three weeks thinking my Deck was broken before I realized it was dust under the stick. Workaround: turn the Deck upside down while cleaning so gravity helps particles fall out instead of deeper in. Library right-click a game Properties Installed Files Verify. Do this for your three most-played games, not all of them. Verification takes 3-12 minutes per title depending on size. Last month I caught a corrupted save for Palworld by checking this way — game crashed on load with no obvious reason. Verified and restarted. Fixed.
Charge to 100%, play until it drops below 10%, then charge back to 100% without interruption. This used to be mandatory on old Lithium-ion cells. Modern Deck batteries don't need this as often, but doing it once a quarter keeps the percentage reporting accurate. The battery gauge was reading 40% when the Deck shut down at 18% last winter. One calibration cycle fixed the drift. This one is controversial. Most people don't need to do it monthly. I do it every 6 months because my Deck runs 8°C hotter after long sessions than it did fresh. Thermal paste degrades. Use honeywell PTM7950, not traditional paste. It's a phase-change material that stays effective longer. Takes 25 minutes if you've done it before, 45 if you're opening the Deck for the first time. I stripped two screws on my first attempt because they sit under rubber feet you have to peel back. If you use any startup scripts or custom configurations, check whether they're still running. Update your shell profile, verify your environment variables aren't pointing at removed directories. On the Deck this means checking whether your custom gamemode profiles in ~/.steam/steam/compatibilitytools.d are still valid after updates.
Get the Full Details
Settings System Network Test Connection. If downloads are slow, try a different DNS. I switched from my ISP's DNS to 1.1.1.1 and saw download speeds jump from 8MB/s to 22MB/s. Worth 30 seconds to check. It doesn't cover everything. Battery degradation from heat isn't fixed by calibration. Screen burn-in on OLED models isn't prevented by any checklist. Controller drift caused by worn potentiometers can't be cleaned away forever — eventually you replace the module. The checklist also assumes you have the tools. If you're not comfortable opening the Deck, skip the thermal paste step and just note when temperatures get too high. Some people treat it like a religious ritual and spend 2 hours on it every month. That's overkill. A focused run-through of the top five items takes about 15 minutes. Everything else is optional based on what you're experiencing.
The One Thing Everyone Misses
The Steam Deck Checklist Monthly should include checking your microsd card health. I didn't do this for four months and lost a save file when the card started failing. Run `fsck` on your SD card once a month if you store games on it. Takes 2 minutes and prevents data loss. That's it. Run through the list, fix what's broken, move on. Don't overthink it.
