09 Nov 2025 — 16 min read
The notion of running full PC games on an Android device used to feel like a bit of a hack: sideload this, patch that, hope your phone didn’t overheat, and pray the games even work. But over the past couple of years, thanks to faster mobile hardware, better compatibility layers, and a new wave of dedicated and powerful handhelds, Android has quietly become a serious platform for gaming; not just a novelty. What used to be experimental now feels not only possible, but genuinely fun.
Enter [GameHub Lite](https://github.com…
09 Nov 2025 — 16 min read
The notion of running full PC games on an Android device used to feel like a bit of a hack: sideload this, patch that, hope your phone didn’t overheat, and pray the games even work. But over the past couple of years, thanks to faster mobile hardware, better compatibility layers, and a new wave of dedicated and powerful handhelds, Android has quietly become a serious platform for gaming; not just a novelty. What used to be experimental now feels not only possible, but genuinely fun.
Enter GameHub Lite, a fork of the official GameHub app, and GameNative, a project that brings your Steam library directly to Android. These two projects share the same spirit: open, user-first, and built around control rather than convenience. Together, they’re shaping what PC gaming on Android looks like beyond cloud streaming.
They also represent a quiet push-back against how complex the Android gaming space has become. The original GameHub looked great on the surface, but under the hood it carried thousands of tracking and analytics files, plus an exhausting list of permissions, enough to make privacy-minded users uneasy. GameHub Lite flips that by stripping all of it out for you. No forced logins. No hidden trackers. No unnecessary cloud authentications. And GameNative takes a similar approach: lightweight, fully offline, with native integration instead of remote accounts or middleware.
The fact that projects like these even exist says a lot about where Android gaming has ended up. Between handhelds like the AYN’s Odin and Thor series, the Retroid Pocket 5, and Anbernic’s latest devices, Android has become a bit of a playground for tinkerers on these powerful handhelds. For the kind of people who’d rather boot into a frontend, launch Steam through a compatibility layer, or test an old PC title running natively instead of streamed. It’s not technically ‘emulation’ in the classic sense; it’s more like translating PC experiences through layers Android can understand, with things like Box64, Winlator, and Turnip drivers quietly doing the heavy lifting in the background.
That’s where GameHub Lite fits in. Not as the emulator itself, but kinda like the glue. It’s the launcher that ties everything together: Steam games, local installs, emulation frontends, all while staying clean, light, and focused on the user rather than analytics. So when the original developer announced that version 4 would be their final update, it looked like the end of the road for a tool that many were loving. Luckily, that wasn’t the case for long. The project is now being maintained by Producdevity, the developer behind EmuReady and part of the Eden Emulator team. Someone already known for keeping Android tools simple, efficient, and open (and a name some of you might recognize from other dev interviews I’ve shared here!).
I caught up with Producdevity to talk about what’s possible now with PC gaming on Android, why GameHub Lite still matters, and where it’s headed next, and also spoke with ‘Utkarsh’ (utkarshdalal) from GameNative to hear how he sees this new wave of Android-based Steam gaming evolving.
Why Steam Emulation Exists:
Tell me what GameHub Lite is, and what it does!
**Producdevity: **GameHub Lite is a community-modified version of GameSir’s GameHub that strips out all the privacy violations while keeping the functionality that makes PC gaming on Android accessible. The original GameHub contained 31 invasive permissions (location, mic, camera, contacts, etc.), over 11,838 telemetry/analytics files (Firebase, Google Analytics, Umeng, JPush, etc.) and six different analytics SDKs collecting a lot more data than would ever be needed for GameHub to function. Clippy (or Python), the original developer, surgically removed all of that through 201 code modification patches, reducing the app from 114MB to 51MB while actually improving performance in many cases as a by product.
What was the original developer trying to achieve with this project? Especially in stripping out all that telemetry and cloud clutter?
**Producdevity: **The original developer created GameHub Lite as a community solution to use GameHub’s functionality without the “outrageous privacy concerns” that came with the original GameHub. It was meant as a temporary solution while the community pushed for better alternatives.
From your perspective, what does ‘Lite’ actually mean here. Just performance, or a kind of philosophy of keeping things clean and open?
**Producdevity: **The name “Lite” reflects a philosophy of simplicity and openness (Loonix mindset as I like to call it). By stripping away unnecessary features, telemetry, and cloud dependencies, GameHub Lite aims to provide users with an experience that matches an open source equivalent. GHL focuses on privacy and user control, it just happen to has slightly better performance in some cases because the app is simply doing less work in the background.
When you took over the project a few days ago, what state was it in technically and structurally?
**Producdevity: **This is a bit hard to answer since it isn’t a regular open source project. We are essentially modifying smali code directly, so there isn’t a traditional codebase to speak of. However, I have been involved pretty early on and the original developer did a great job of documenting the changes using AI, which is in my opinion a great use of AI. All the documentation is available on GitHub, including the Cloudflare Workers that were used to remove the cloud dependencies.
What did you see as its biggest potential. Something worth keeping alive?
**Producdevity: **GameHub does a wonderful job making PC/x86_64 games accessible on Android devices. It doesn’t scare users away like Winlator does for example, which is very powerful but doesn’t hide its complexity, which isn’t a good nor a bad thing.
The main worry with GameHub is the incentive behind it, as it is created by a company. GameSir, the company behind GameHub, released an early version of GameHub that was paywalled, you had to connect a GameSir controller to use it. This was later removed, but it shows that the project is being developed with a profit motive in mind. This is not inherently bad, but it does make me wonder about the long term future of the project.
GameNative:
Tell me more about GameNative. How does it differ from GameHub Lite?
**Utkarsh: **While GameHub Lite is a modified version of a proprietary app (GameHub), GameNative has been open-source and transparent from the get-go. In just a few months’ time, it’s managed to improve by leaps and bounds, to the point where in many cases, GameNative now matches or even outperforms GameHub in FPS and stability, and has built an active and enthusiastic community around it. The developer has promised to always keep it completely free and open-source, and though sometimes games that work on GameHub don’t work on GameNative, that gap is narrowing quickly.
What are the long-term goals of GameNative?
**Utkarsh: **In the long run, I’m planing to make the app something that can turn every Android device into a Steam Deck. The goal is to make PC-class gaming accessible on any Android device - phone, TV, tablet, or handheld - without the need for expensive hardware, eventually making consoles and gaming PCs obsolete.
GameNative will always remain completely free and transparent to users, with revenue potentially coming from partnering with device manufacturers, customising GameNative to deliver better performance with less heat on their devices.
What’s your opinion on GameHub?
**Utkarsh: **I have a mixed opinion of GameHub. While I admit that they have built an impressive product that has made it easier to run PC games on Android devices, it’s disappointing that they use open-source software without credit, and also modify open-source software and make it proprietary without releasing the source code as they are required to do under license. Examples of this include the graphics driver that they use (forked from https://github.com/leegao/bionic-vulkan-wrapper) and Wine (forked from https://github.com/ValveSoftware/wine).
GameHub is also slightly suspect in the permissions it requests from users, and the large amount of telemetry data it sends home, but so far, nothing nefarious has been proven.
In the past, the company that owns GameHub, GameSir (a controller manufacturer), made another emulator called EggNS which did something similar: made a proprietary fork of an open-source product, built up a user base, and then overnight made it inaccessible to users without a GameSir controller.
All these put together give me the impression of a company that has questionable practices.
While I have respect for the GameHub developers’ technical abilities and understand that it is a free app and they need to have a defensible moat if they ever do monetise, I think their approach is quite short-sighted, as the minor tweaks they make can be easily reverse-engineered (as proven by GameHub Lite), and has only earned them a bad reputation.
Why do you think something like GameNative is the way forward?
Utkarsh: Both GameNative and GameHub depend on the same open-source components that neither of them has any role in creating - Wine/Proton, DXVK, Fex, Box64, etc. In a few months’ time, at the current pace, GameNative will be fully on-par with, if not better than, GameHub. At that point, the tech will stop being the differentiator, and the preferred app will be the one that will have the better community, reputation, and UX, all of which GameNative leads in.
A parallel that can be drawn is Mixpanel vs PostHog. Both are analytics apps which do similar things, but in recent years, PostHog has become the clear leader, because by being open-source, transparent and self-hostable, it has become the software of choice for developers solely because of its reputation.
On top of that, GameNative is starting to attract contributions from the developers who are actually working on the underlying software, meaning that if it can pull this off, it will be at the cutting-edge, while GameHub will always lag behind.
How sustainable is GameNative, if it doesn’t have any revenue and is going to be free and open-source?
**Utkarsh: **Though GameNative doesn’t generate revenue today, the project aims to partner with device manufacturers to optimise GameNative for their specific hardware — improving performance, reducing heat, and delivering a better gaming experience out of the box. These collaborations will allow GameNative to remain free for users while building a sustainable business around OEM integrations and support.
Unlike GameHub, which relies on a well-funded team, GameNative is lean and community-driven. It’s primarily built and maintained by a single developer, with the support of contributors from around the world. The project is also open to the right kind of angel or venture investment to accelerate development and scale partnerships without compromising its open-source values.
Because GameNative is fully open-source, it isn’t dependent on any one person or company. Even if the original developer steps away, the codebase and community can continue evolving, just as GameNative itself grew from the earlier open-source foundation of Pluvia.
The GameHub Lite Hand-Off:
How did the hand-off from the original developer to you come about? Was it planned, or more of an ‘I’ll make sure this survives’ moment?
**Producdevity: **When GameHub Lite was first released, I performed an in-depth security audit. As a moderator of r/EmulationOnAndroid, I felt it was necessary to verify that the app was safe before allowing it to be shared on the sub-reddit. Everything checked out, and shortly after that I got in touch with the original developer. We stayed in contact, and I have been involved in the project ever since. The original developer handled most of the core work, and I contributed where I could.
Since development for GameHub was already being discussed in the EmuReady Discord and I was already participating in the project, it made sense for me to take over when the original developer decided to step back. It was mostly a matter of ensuring that the project continued, because I believe in its goals, although I do not see it as a long-term solution for the community. I believe GameNative is the long-term answer, since it is open source and has a strong community behind it.
There is room for both projects to exist, GameNative and GameHub. It is not that I think GameSir cannot be trusted, but having an open source alternative is important. Since GameHub is already built mostly on open source components, that reinforces my view that GameNative is the direction the community should move toward over time.
What role does EmuReady play now, if any? Are you hosting updates, helping maintain the codebase, or shaping the project’s next identity?
**Producdevity: **EmuReady provides compatibility data integration for GameHub Lite v4. The compatibility badges in GameHub that seemed random and unreliable were replaced with community-submitted, moderator-reviewed, and community-voted data from EmuReady. However, EmuReady’s future focus isn’t specific to GameHub Lite, but rather on building a broader ecosystem for emulation.
What kind of challenges come with taking over a project like this. Technically or even community-wise?
**Producdevity: **The hardest part is the lack of a traditional codebase and the “drama” the community likes to make up. It’s one of the reasons the original developer stepped back. There is a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding about what GameHub Lite is and what our goals are. I genuinely lost joy in working on the project and being completely honest, I am not sure if there will a version after the one that is currently being worked on. I see my time better spent on other projects like Eden, EmuReady, and GameNative.
The Big Picture: PC Gaming on Android:
Image credit to Reddit user DarkDigital. Running Halo CE from 60-140 FPS, high settings on their Retroid Pocket 5
Five years ago, the idea of running full PC games on Android felt like a novelty. How far have we actually come?
**Producdevity: **We’ve gone from “technically possible with massive compromises” to “genuinely playable on flagship hardware.” In 2020, running Windows games on Android meant Termux setups with Box86 that maybe got 15fps on simple 2D games. While not perfect, modern android handheld are very affordable and capable of running a wide range of PC games at playable framerates. The work that many people in the community like brunodev85, coffincolors, pissblaster649, KIMCHI, and others have done to optimize emulators and compatibility layers has been crucial in this progress. Even large corporations like Valve and AMD are now investing in this space or have already made massive contributions to projects like Proton, which is a testament to how far we’ve come.
This may be a bit optimistic, but I believe that in the next 5 years, we will see Android handhelds that can run pretty much the same library of games that the Steam Deck can run today.
Between emulation and native ports, where do you think Android gaming stands today compared to handheld PCs like the Deck or Ally?
**Producdevity: Android matches Steam Deck for older titles and indies but falls behind on cutting-edge AAA. I don’t think Emulation will be the future of gaming on Android when we are talking about PC games. My personal belief is that all this emulation hype will get more people to notice android as a gaming platform. Emulation will always add an overhead that native ports won’t have, but it is a great way to get people interested in gaming on android. (For example, running Subnautica on Android via Proton/Wine is possible, but the native port runs at a stable 60fps while the emulated version struggles to maintain 12fps mid-tier hardware.) **
In your opinion, what are the biggest bottlenecks that still make Android a bit behind: performance, compatibility, or maybe just developer interest?
Producdevity: I personally believe the market is still too small for developers to take Android gaming seriously (talking about Android handelds). Performance is improving rapidly with each new generation of hardware, but compatibility and proper configuration are challenges, which is exactly what EmuReady solves by crowdsourcing what works on which devices.
Hopefully EmuReady wouldn’t be needed when it comes to PC gaming on Android in the future, but until then I am happy to see it helping people get the most out of their devices.
Do you think the average user now understands how to piece these setups together, or is that still niche territory?
**Producdevity: **I think it has become more accessible, but it’s still niche territory. A spoiler for EmuReady: there are a collection of features/tools in development that will make this significantly easier for users who aren’t tech-savvy or familiar with emulation on Android. I will share more about this soon!
Under the Hood: Design, Privacy, and Function:
Video credit to Ryan Retro: “GameHub LITE | Introduction and VS GameHub”
What’s your stance on telemetry and analytics in open-source apps? Are they ever justified, or is it always a slippery slope?
**Producdevity: **I believe it is justified, as long as it’s transparent. I personally don’t care what data you are collecting, but the users should be informed and have the option to opt-out. Being informed is something that GameHub has significantly improved in their latest releases, which is great to see. However, I don’t believe that it will ever become opt-out, nor do I think it’s realistic to expect a company to do that when their business model relies on data collection. We can’t change this, but the FOSS community can provide alternatives that respect user privacy.
Beyond privacy, removing all that bloat must’ve affected performance too. Did you notice any tangible gains after the cleanup?
**Producdevity: **Very minor performance gains in most cases, simply because there is a lot less happening in the background and every time resource is being used for emulation. It helps, but the FPS differences are negligible in most cases.
Can you explain how GameHub Lite actually handles game libraries? What’s happening under the hood that makes it efficient?
**Producdevity: **Referring to the way GameHub downloads games, it uses an open source library called JavaSteam, this is made by the same developers who make Pluvia (Pluvia is what GameNative is based on). (sidenote: this is an MIT licensed library, I was sad to see that GameHub doesn’t credit the original developers anywhere in the app, website or documentation.)
There’s mention of supporting ‘emulation frontends’ (which I just saw announced today for Beacon Launcer!) What does that mean in practical terms for users?
**Producdevity: **This means that users are able to launch their games directly from launchers/frontends like ESDE and Beacon. A feature that has been requested for a long time but was never implemented in the original GameHub. Another reason why I believe open source projects to be superior, as the community can add features that are important to them.
If someone installs it today, what’s the biggest improvement they’ll notice compared to the original, non-lite, version?
**Producdevity: **Offline support, no required account, no tracking, no cloud dependencies, and better compatibility data via EmuReady. All things I hope to see GameHub implement in the future, and I am happy to help if GameHub/GameSir is ever interested in collaborating. Seeing them improve the privacy aspect shows that they are paying attention to the community, which is great.
Crossroads: Eden, EmuReady, and the Future:
Image credit to user the_jzkz who finished Titanfall 2 on their Xiaomi Poco phone by using Gamehub Lite
You’ve been building a bit of an ecosystem: tools and emulators and projects that respect privacy, unify experiences, are open in nature and simplify setup. Is that the end goal here? How are you maintaining steam..?
**Producdevity: **I don’t want to share too much about my personal life, but if anything I would like people to know that although I haven’t been as active lately, I am still very much involved in the projects I care about. It just takes a bit more time to balance everything these days.
What’s the community been like since the transition? Supportive, cautious, excited?
**Producdevity: **It has divided opinions. Some are excited to see the project continue, while others have been making comments about how there is malicious intent behind the project, which is disheartening. This didn’t really change after the transition, but it seems to be something people bring up to discredit the project. Another thing many people have been bringing up is how we should be so worried about a Chinese company collecting data, while ignoring the massive data collection happening on Western platforms like Google, Meta, Steam, Epic Games Store, and others. This has been something the community has made up, has never been a concern of anyone involved in the project but does highlight how the android emulation community likes to create drama where there is none.
Finally, what’s your personal hope for GameHub Lite’s next chapter? What do you want it to stand for?
**Producdevity: **I hope that GameHub lite was enough for GameHub to take notice and improve their privacy practices and that everyone who has the means to contribute would rather spent their time on open source projects like GameNative instead. I don’t see a long term future for GameHub lite, but I do hope that it has made a positive impact on the community and the way we think about privacy in gaming apps.
Something Different:
What’s your favorite Android handheld to test on right now?
**Producdevity: **I only have one handheld, the Retroid Pocket 5. This is a great device but I have been interested in something like the AYN Thor to add support for dual screen and have the ability to test more demanding programs/games. The projects I work aren’t commercially driven, so I don’t have the budget to get every new device that comes out. But I work with that I have and try to optimize for a wide range of hardware.
Do you still game on PC yourself, or has Android taken over?
**Producdevity: **I spend very little time gaming, but when I do I switch between my Retroid Pocket 5 and Steam Deck. Some games are just better suited for handhelds, while others are better on a traditional PC setup. This is definitely more based on a vibe thing than anything else.
If you could change one thing about the Android gaming landscape, what would it be?
**Producdevity: **Being active in Open Source communities for 15 years I would wish that the Android Emulation community would be less toxic and more welcoming to newcomers. I realize that the audience may be generally younger compared to other open source communities and I don’t know if the entitled attitude and toxic behavior will ever change but I do hope to see less drama between developers and developer teams in general. We are all here because we love emulation and the craft around making emulation possible and it bothers me to see so much negativity in a space like this.
A *big *thanks to both developers for taking the time to chat and share a glimpse into how these projects come together. Whether you’re launching a ROM, managing a growing library, or trying to get your favorite Steam title running on a phone, it’s their kind of passion that keeps this space evolving. Android might’ve started as the platform for quick mobile games, but with projects like these it’s quickly becoming something much more ambitious.
More information on GameHub Lite:
More information on GameNative:
And one little shout-out to all those who have been keep up with, and enjoying enjoying these dev interviews (like Mr Sujano!), I’m sure you all will enjoy this one. There’s more on the way too!
About The Author:
dash
Dash is 𝘰𝘣𝘴𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘥 with gaming in all its forms. Opting for FOSS over everything else, you can follow along here for articles on handheld gaming, Android emulation, GOG, gaming retrospectives and the developers keeping open-source gaming alive.