When does the Steam client update the games automatically? Never?

[o]

...Does it schedule it to do it at a specific time and if that time is missed, it just never updates that game?

So I got crazy and bought so many disk drives I can have 3-4 dozens games installed at once. So there are like 5-6 updates per day.

But every day I turn on my PC (because I don't leave it on overnight) and I have to go through my library and find each "UPDATE QUEUED" marked game and click the "UPDATE" button on each, manually.

So instead of cursing at my screen I checked the download queue and the games are queued to update IN THE PAST. Like right now, Astroneer is scheduled to update at 5:45AM yesterday when my PC was turned off. Well it's switched on now. And it's scheduled in the past, with nothing under "Up next".
Screenshot: https://pasteboard.co/udb94FVQiW5R.png (why do we still have to pastebin image btw, is it 2001?)

Is it deliberate to "save bandwidth" or just one of the thousands of those corporate-sponsored bugs typical of the 2020's?

[Jaunitta 🌸]

Actually its not from Steam . The game developers apply updates patches and news to all our games that we can usualy find info on either at the Home Tab in our library or on the game's discussion hub the link to it is found under the Artwork of every game.
When Steam client itself has an updated its a popup that shows Steam requires a restart.
What the news was or patch was can be viewed at the top right by clicking on that horn icon next to messages from subbed discussions.
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/593110/?emclan=103582791457287600&emgid=3091163163109910644

[rawWwRrr]

Originally posted by Nicky the Hutt:

.So instead of cursing at my screen I checked the download queue and the games are queued to update IN THE PAST. Like right now, Astroneer is scheduled to update at 5:45AM yesterday when my PC was turned off. Well it's switched on now. And it's scheduled in the past, with nothing under "Up next".
Screenshot: https://pasteboard.co/udb94FVQiW5R.png (why do we still have to pastebin image btw, is it 2001?)

There is a Thursday every week. From your screenshot, "Thursday" means the next Thursday, not yesterday, as in Thursday, March 31.

Originally posted by Nicky the Hutt:

But every day I turn on my PC (because I don't leave it on overnight) and I have to go through my library and find each "UPDATE QUEUED" marked game and click the "UPDATE" button on each, manually.

They are being scheduled based on how often you are playing that game. If it's game that you are currently playing it will update automatically. If it's a game that you haven't touched in a while or rarely play, the update will be scheduled out to a week or so. And no, you don't have to have your computer on at that exact time.

Originally posted by Nicky the Hutt:

Is it deliberate to "save bandwidth" or just one of the thousands of those corporate-sponsored bugs typical of the 2020's?

Scheduling the updates was implemented at the start of the pandemic as a way to help balance the bandwidth and load on networks and servers.
https://steamcommunity.com/games/593110/announcements/detail/2074411495515541376
Overall it has done well and Valve has not made any indication that they are going to remove the feature.

Scheduling updates shouldn't affect you. If you haven't played a game in a while, what difference does it make if it is updated now or later? And if you want to play a game that has a scheduled update, you can obviously force the update to happen immediately as you have already discovered.

If the scheduling of the updates bothers too much, you can prevent them from being scheduled by changing the automatic updates setting to High Priority. However, that is a per-title setting and must be changed on each title separately. Steam will default any newly downloaded game to the Always setting which will schedule the updates if it sees you haven't played the game for a bit.

[o]

Originally posted by rawWwRrr:

(...)

That was a very informative answer, thanks! Feels much less like there's something wrong with my Steam client now.

About games that I don't play frequently, it's a bit ironic because I am waiting for updates to address issues and bugs that put me off playing last time lol.. But now I found the high priority setting you mentioned, and it's gonna be helpful.

[BoffinBrain]

Originally posted by rawWwRrr:

Scheduling the updates was implemented at the start of the pandemic as a way to help balance the bandwidth and load on networks and servers.

Thank you for this. I have no idea why Valve never announced this properly to all end-users so they can understand why the client appears to be 'broken'. I've been battling this issue for months. Enjoy your award!