The Steam Deck builds a shader cache whenever a game is launched, which allows the Deck to run games with less stuttering during gameplay. However, these files also take up a lot of space over time, which can lead to your Deck suddenly missing gigabytes of storage space. It’s possible to remove the shader cache files by going straight to the folder they’re stored in and deleting them, and while it might end up affecting performance of certain games if you still have them installed, it won’t cause long-term damage or make anything unplayable.
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After turning on the Steam Deck, press the Steam button to open the Menu and click on the Power button. From there, select the option to switch to Desktop Mode, which will allow you to enter the Deck’s Linux operating system. You can then use the file browser pinned at the taskbar to navigate the Steam Deck’s folders. Choose the Home option in the Places category that appears and look for the .steam folder — you might need to hit the three bars on the top-right of the window and select Show Hidden Files before you can access it.
Once you are in the .steam folder, find the folder simply labeled steam, followed by steamapps, then shadercache. This is where you’ll find the shader cache files stored within numbered folders. If you don’t want to delete everything at once, you can cross-check each folder by looking up its number on a service like SteamDB, which will correlate to the Steam game ID of a specific game you’ve launched.
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