Steam -105

On screen: Failed to load web page (unknown error) — Error Code: -105

What it actually means

This is not a Steam platform code. It comes from the Chromium browser embedded in the Steam client, with the sign inverted: Steam's -105 is Chromium's ERR_NAME_NOT_RESOLVED.

Chromium's description: the host name could not be resolved. This is DNS — your machine could not turn Steam's address into a number.

Which means the rest of Steam is very likely working. Your library opens, your games launch, and a part of the client that happens to be a web browser cannot load a page.

How to tell which one you have

Run nslookup store.steampowered.com. If it does not resolve, it is DNS and nothing about Steam. If it resolves and the client still will not load the page, the client's browser cache or an ad blocker is interfering.

Fixes, in the order worth trying

1. Change DNS to 1.1.1.1 or 8.8.8.8 — The direct fix for a resolution failure.
2. Flush the DNS cache — ipconfig /flushdns on Windows.
3. Delete the client's web browser data — Steam, Settings, Web Browser.
4. Turn off ad blocking and DNS filtering — Pi-hole and similar DNS-level blockers are a frequent cause, because Steam's pages pull from several domains.
5. Check the hosts file for Steam entries — Old guides and some tools add entries there that outlive their usefulness.

Steam's client embeds a Chromium browser, and these numbered codes are Chromium's own network errors with the sign flipped. We verified each one against Chromium's error list rather than guessing. That is why the on-screen message is the same unhelpful line for all of them while the causes are completely different — and why most of them mean Steam is working fine. Valve publishes no article for this code. Worth knowing: Valve publishes no status page of its own. The link in their own support article now redirects to a sales chart. That gap is why we measure Steam ourselves, by probing its public endpoints every five minutes.

Common questions