Download Queue Stalling (Stops Working)

[DanielR-I]

Your system information

• Steam client version (build number or date): Aug 15, 2025
• Distribution (e.g. Ubuntu): Manjaro
• Opted into Steam client beta?: [Yes/No] Yes
• Have you checked for system updates?: [Yes/No] Yes
• Steam Logs: [generate by running this command in a terminal tar -zcvf ~/Desktop/steam-logs.tar.gz ~/.steam/steam/logs] Not sure if these would still be relevant after switching from the Beta to the Stable Client
• GPU: AMD

Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:

I initially noticed I had a Download Queue issue while downloading/installing a new steam purchase... It did start, but stalled and sat at 0bps for the longest time before I intervened and aborted.

I tried many times to restart the install/download, the game entered the download queue, but sat stalled at 0 progress/bps. I tried many things to get it going... rebooting PC, restarting steam client, verifying library, clearing the download cache... and at some point along the way it finally downloaded the new game's files but sat at 99% overall progress... I left it like this for a bit figuring it might have still been doing something in the background... eventually I thought I'd try launching the game from the desktop shortcut as I thought the launch popup might include additional details... the popup had it's own progress bar that started around 45% and was slowly increasing... I watched as it reach 99% (in sync with the download queue) and once it hit 100% the steam client tossed up the "game ready" toast/notification and the download queue updated with the game sitting in the completed section. Game launched as I had clicked the desktop shortcut, and I closed it.

I thought this was a very unconventional installation and selected to verify the game files... game was put into the download queue and sat there at 0 bps/progress.

Closed/restarted the steam beta client (as I noticed I could not requeue a verify as the properties page for the game thought one was still in progress at 0%) and waited to see how other background downloads were handled. I did have some successful shader/content updates, but eventually those successes were replaced by similar downloads that were stalled at 0 progress/bps.

I had actually had bought 2 games and tried installing the second which completed successfully (small 2Gb game)... thinking the issue I just had might have been temporary I retried verifying the 1st game... instant stall at 0 bps/progress.

Eventually through enough client restarts (~10) I was able to get the 1st game to verify successfully. I'm not sure of the issue is local to the steam beta client while posting/processing the queued "jobs" or in the handshaking it's attempting to do with the steam download servers. At this point the issue feels random with a heavy bias on stalling vs success.

So while my initial discovery of the issue were around a fresh install and verification... once the shader/content updates exhibited the same stalling I felt it was appropriate the title the issue as an overall download queue issue.

Steps for reproducing this issue:

1. buy a new game and try install it
2. if it downloads, try verify it (have even seen a verify trigger/queue 6 downloads... common reditributables, proton, three linux runtimes, plus the game... failure can happen as any one of the "six" are added as the current download)
3. once downloaded, wait for any content/shader updates... they also have a chance to stall

Any workarounds?

As per a discussion on the steam client release thread @ https://steamcommunity.com/groups/SteamClientBeta/eventcomments/802322896293883166/?tscn=1755598430

I switched from the Beta Client to the Stable Client and the download queue is operating normally (so far). I have verified three games of various sizes (largest 40GB, smallest 1.2GB), two of which triggered six downloads each (common reditributables, proton, three linux runtimes, plus the game)... all games/tools (13 in all) completed sequentially without issue or stall... but I will keep monitoring.

[Asbjoedt]

For me, I get the problem when I try to install any game from library. Steam downloads 222,9MB of a game and then puts the game as "Download queued".

I run latest Arch and installed Steam through Pacman. I do not run the Steam beta.

UPDATE: I restated my PC and Steam now downloads games, lol.

[DanielR-I]

I'm wondering if switching back to Beta might be a valid test?

Thought being that when I switched to Stable it downloaded a bigger package and there were some popups about progress being made as it "redeployed"... and I'm wondering if something got/gets corrected with a "redeploy" of the Beta package?

Thought being... if swapping back to Beta works that might imply I had some "underlying Steam corruption" during one of the Beta updates that a full "redeploy" overwrote/corrected.

Does this make sense?

Update: Well, worth a try, but swapping back to the Beta Client (350MB package) brought instant queue stalling... exited/restarted the beta client and got the same stalled download queue. Swapped back to the Stable client and got 6/6 (game with proton, 3 linux runtimes, and common redistibutables) without issue on a game verify right away.

[DanielR-I]

noticed the following in the Aug 26 Steam Beta client release notes....

General
Fixed game downloads not starting if user is subscribed to a controller configuration that is not available anymore

.... and decided to swap back to the Beta Client to see if this was relevant to my issue; as I do use a controller.

I have verified the same three games as a test (largest 40GB, smallest 1.2GB), two of which triggered six downloads each (common reditributables, proton, three linux runtimes, plus the game)... all games/tools (13 in all) completed sequentially without issue or stall.

Thank you for finding/correcting my issue in the Aug 26th Beta Client!!

Is it possible to learn more about the issue?

• How would I identify games using an orphaned controller config so that I can set a new/relevant one?
• Will the update give us feedback on any orphaned controller config's that the update/download process discovers so that we can address them?
• Why/how would one game having an orphaned controller config stall the entire queue and not just the update for the "offending" game it's linked to? Hmm, I guess within that question lies the core bug.
• If my controller was unplugged (currently connected via USB), would that have still triggered the controller config check? Same question for if I had disabled Steam Input?