Stadia hardware refunds to start rolling out in the next two weeks

On September 30th, Google officially announced the end of Stadia, - a years-long experiment in cloud gaming. Now, as sad as we might be, this was a long time coming, as many factors pointed toward Stadia's eventual demise. From the cancellation of Google's own game studio venture to high-level executives leaving the project, it all went sideways for Stadia.

Two months ago, when the news broke, Google announced that it would fully reimburse all Stadia users who bought games and the hardware from Google. This covers all Stadia hardware purchases made via the Google Store as well as any Stadia Store game or add-on content purchases. As you might imagine, this adds up to a lot of money.

Software refunds began at the beginning of last month, and now it looks like Google is ready to move to the hardware side of things. The company started sending out emails to customers, informing them that the refunds would be issued in the next couple of weeks, with users who purchased their hardware directly through Google getting their money back first within the next two weeks.

Currently, Google is offering refunds on the Founders Edition, Premiere Edition, Play and Watch with Google TV packages, and the Stadia Controller. Google Stadia players will be allowed to continue playing until January 18, 2023, when the platform will be shut down.

Google also said that it anticipates the bulk of reimbursements to be finished by mid-January 2023. Finally, if you don't want to lose any progress in a game that you've put hundreds of hours into, there's the option to transfer your progress to a new service.