Steam Family Feature Officially Launched “Share Library with Up to 6 People”

Back in March, Valve launched Steam Family in beta, a collection of features that were intended to be useful for multiple gamers in a family. Now, Steam Family is out of beta and available to all Steam users.

Steam Family replaces Family Sharing (used to lend games to family members) and Family View (now known as Parental Controls and used to limit family members’ access to certain Steam features and content), and allows family members to make purchase requests.

The biggest change is that up to six people can now play games from a shared game library at the same time with Family Sharing. However, if more than one person wants to play the same game at the same time, they will need multiple copies of the game. If the game supports Family Sharing, you can play it offline.

reference : Not all Steam games support Family Sharing. Developers may opt out of Family Sharing on a game-by-game basis for any reason. To see if a game is available for sharing with family members, visit the individual game page on the Steam store.

To use Family features, you must create a Family Sharing or join an existing family. Once you create a family, you can invite up to five other family members. Each member of Family Sharing maintains their own save files, challenges, and Workshop subscriptions.

Anyone can participate as a family member now, but Valve’s intention is for the ‘family’ feature to be comprised of ‘close family members’, and if there are users who abuse it, eligibility may be restricted in the future.

Also, if one person cheats and gets banned from a game that everyone shares, the original owner of the game will also get banned. That’s why you should only join Family Sharing that you trust.
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