How does the status "Away" work?

[Jules]

AFK is one thing that I know, but if I use a controller on a game whilst not touching any of my kb / mouse will it give the "away" status?

[Muppet among Puppets]

When you are in a steam game it shows you are ingame.

If you use your computer steam should not go to away on its own.

[Carolynne]

The away status is based on any movement in your computer, say if your mouse cursor moves or if any key has been pressed. Basically it mimics the idle status of the computer, the computer itself counts the minutes of idling before it can put the computer in resting mode.

Steam's away status mimics that, after five minutes of inactivity your status changes to away.

Using any peripheral would wake the computer thus trigger Steam into online mode regardless.