Changelog

👋 Hey there!

We’re back with Hydra 3.6.0 — codename Lumen. This update brings something many of you have been waiting for: full integration with Decky Loader via our brand-new plugin, plus some powerful improvements to how you manage backups and favorites inside Hydra Launcher.

Let’s dive in.

🧩 Introducing the Hydra Decky Plugin

Hydra now plays natively with Game Mode on the Steam Deck thanks to our official Decky plugin!

If you’ve enabled developer mode in Decky Loader, you can install it right now using this link:
👉 hydra.la/decky
It’ll also be available on the Decky Store very soon.

Here’s what the plugin can do:

• Track playtime across both Steam-native and non-Steam games — right from Game Mode
  

• Manage Cloud Saves seamlessly:

  • Automatically backs up your game when it closes
    

  • Allows restoring backups directly from the plugin
    

• Receive Steam notifications inside Game Mode:

  • Get alerts when a friend starts playing or sends you a friend request
    

📌 New in Cloud Save Management

We’ve added more control over your backups:

• Pin your backups:
  Mark a backup as frozen so it won’t be overwritten by future automatic saves.

• Rename backups:
  Whether they’re manual or automatic, you can now give backups a custom name.
  

• Favorites, now synced:
  Favoriting a game is now tied to your Hydra account, not just your local device — perfect for syncing across machines.

We’re really excited about this release — especially what it means for Steam Deck users. With the plugin and new backup tools, managing your library and saves just got a whole lot easier.

Until next time — enjoy the ride, and keep playing. 🎮

👋 Hello again!

We’re excited to introduce the latest version of Hydra — say hello to Lumen!

This is one of our biggest updates yet, packed with new features, improvements, and polish across the board. We've revamped the Achievements System, enhanced Linux support, and upgraded Cloud Save functionality.

🌟 New Achievements System

Something many of you have been asking for is here: better achievement notifications!
Previously, we relied on Windows’ native notifications, which required a bit of tweaking to work properly (and still didn’t feel quite right).

Now, we’ve brought back our custom-rendered achievement notifications, completely redesigned and improved:

• Achievements now have rarity tiers:
  🟩 Common
  🟦 Rare
  🟪 Platinum (a.k.a. flex mode)

🎨 Achievements + Themes = 🔥

Theme creators, we didn’t forget about you.
You can now fully customize the look of achievements within your themes!
Our embedded code editor even includes a live preview for each variation so you can see exactly how your notifications will appear.

Also: the Theme Shop now shows which themes support achievement customization — no need to resubmit your theme. Just push an update with your customizations and the shop will auto-detect it!

🐧 Linux Love

Hydra is a favorite among Linux users and Steam Deck owners, and we’re committed to making it even better:

☁️ Seamless Cross-Platform Cloud Save

Hydra’s Cloud Save system now works flawlessly between Windows and Linux.
The only setup required on Linux is mapping your Wine Prefix — and we have a helpful guide for that in our Help Center.

Once that’s done, backing up and restoring saves across platforms is seamless.

📦 Built-in Aria2 Library on Linux

Installing Aria2 manually — especially on the Steam Deck — used to be a pain.
That’s why we’ve now bundled Aria2 directly with Hydra on Linux. No setup needed — it just works.

🎮 Add Non-Steam Games, the Right Way

You can now add Non-Steam Shortcuts directly from Hydra.
This not only adds the executable to your Steam library — it also passes along library assets like icons and banners to make it look amazing in Game Mode.

To use this:
Go to a game’s screen → Options → Select an executable → Create Steam Shortcut

And if you’re on Linux? Hydra will automatically create and map the Wine Prefix for the game, so Cloud Save works out of the box. How cool is that?

We hope you love this update as much as we loved building it.
We can’t wait to see the amazing themes you create — and how you style those achievements! 🏆

Until next time — have fun and game on!

👋 Hey there!

Our closed beta for Nimbus has officially wrapped up, and thanks to your incredible feedback, we've gathered some awesome insights to share:

📦 Over 100 TB of data was transferred through our servers — mind-blowing! 🤯

⚡ 80% of testers reported excellent speeds, consistently faster than torrents, with many reaching over 50 MB/s!

🌎 We’ve added three new servers in São Paulo to boost performance even further. 🔥

What’s next?

With all this data, we now have a clear picture of our monthly server costs. While we’re not ready to announce exact pricing just yet, we can tell you this:

Nimbus will be cheaper than our current Cloud subscription, and if you're already a Cloud subscriber, you'll get it for an even better price.

We're also working on upgrading our infrastructure to make Nimbus rock-solid and ready to become your go-to solution.

💬 If you were part of the beta and still have feedback, we’d love to hear it! Please drop your thoughts in our official feedback channel.

Thank you again for your trust and support. We’re building Nimbus for you — and we can’t wait to show you what’s coming next. 🚀

Huge news this time, as we are thrilled to announce a new download service for you and also some fixes and enhancements!

Nimbus

We are very excited to finally announce our download service, Nimbus, after months of planning. We want to offer you the best download experience, with the best possible speed, without having to worry about torrent availability!

Nimbus will be an exclusive service for Hydra Launcher and we are launching it today in closed beta, at no additional cost, for Hydra Cloud subscribers. With it, you will not have to worry about a torrent being available or having enough seeds for you to have a decent download. There will also be no download limit, so you will not have to worry about your download being interrupted before finishing.

We really want you to try it out and let us know what you think and expect from the service.

We have not yet defined how long Nimbus will remain in beta. We will be testing the server infrastructure requirements, costs, and your feedback and comments so that Nimbus not only meets your expectations, but completely exceeds them at the lowest possible price.

We can guarantee that it will be cheaper than the current Hydra Cloud subscription, and in addition, users who are Hydra Cloud subscribers will get a discount on the Nimbus subscription.

General fixes and enhancements

• Fixed download sources not showing or importing correctly

• Fixed Gofile downloads not starting

• General improvements for all HTTP downloads

• New custom implementation of how we manage downloads. This also gives more transparency to our users, as the code is available in our repository.

• New option to choose MB/s or mbps for download speed
  

  
  

Important note

We also want to reinforce our commitment to our users by saying that we are launching our own download service and that in no way does this mean that we will harm the services that we already support. We will continue to provide the best service we can, and always trying to enhance our platform as a whole.

Hello again dear friends

Today we are presenting some High Quality of Life improvements

Common redistributables install

Many games need some common softwares to be installed on your machine to work properly. We now give your a quick way to install them if you need.

By just clicking the “Install” button Hydra will prompt you to start the install.

All of the software installed can be found on this repository: hydra-common-redist

Automatic extract of downloaded files

Hydra now gives you the option to automatically extract the games that are downloaded by a compacted file.

All you have to do is check the option before starting the game download. And, as soon as the game is downloaded, Hydra will start to extract it to the same folder that is was downloaded.

Download sources synchronization

Uses Hydra in more than one computer? Or had to format your disk?

Hydra now syncs them in your account so you never need to worry about missing your beloved download sources anymore.

What do you think about this update? We always read what you comment in our changelogs!

TorBox has made changes to their API access, and as a result, Free users will no longer be able to use third-party apps, including Hydra Launcher.

To continue using Hydra Launcher with TorBox, you will now need a paid TorBox account. If you want to test TorBox before subscribing, they are offering a 24-hour trial for $1, which will grant full API access and integration with Hydra Launcher.

🔹 What does this mean for you?

• If you are on a Free TorBox plan, Hydra Launcher will no longer work.

• If you have a paid TorBox account, nothing changes—you can continue using Hydra Launcher as usual.

• If you want to test the integration, you can use TorBox’s 24-hour trial for $1.

For more information or questions about this change, please contact TorBox support.

Big news! 🚀 Automatic Cloud Sync is now live for all Hydra Cloud subscribers! This has been one of your most requested features, and we’re thrilled to bring it to you. 🔥

How to enable Automatic Cloud Sync

1️⃣ Open the game page in Hydra:

2️⃣ Head to Options:

3️⃣ You'll see a brand-new option: "Enable Automatic Cloud Sync" – toggle it on!

Once activated, Hydra Cloud will automatically back up your game saves every time you open or close the game. No more worrying about losing progress! 🎮💾

🔄 Backup Management

When your backup limit is reached, Hydra Cloud will automatically delete the oldest backup to make space for new ones. That way, you always have your most recent saves without any hassle!

Enjoy the seamless syncing, and as always, let us know what you think! 💙

We are giving the first step towards an enhanced experince with Hydra!

We remade all the pages used to login to Hydra, and to manage your account and subscription.

We aimed at something more pleasant visually and that allows you to completely manage your account and Hydra Cloud subscription.

New login screen:

New subscription screen (checkout.hydralauncher.gg):

What do you think? Tell us in the comments!

As always, we are available in your support chat or in our email support@hydralauncher.gg