Cyberpunk 2077 stuttering lag fps drops – It is obvious that Cyberpunk 2077 is an AAA title, and most of the AAA titles released this year have not been free from problems. The majority had horrible performance issues during the launch. People were complaining that they were experiencing lag, fps drops, and stuttering. Well, Cyberpunk is no different. In the PC version of Cyberpunk 2077 players are facing issues like lag, fps drops, and stuttering. This guide consists of a list of the errors and how to fix them.
How to fix Lag, FPS Drops and Stuttering in Cyberpunk 2077
Before you move further into the guide, make sure you take a look at the minimum and recommended requirements of Cyberpunk 2077. And also download the drivers optimized for Cyberpunk 2077. You can check out the system requirements from here. Nvidia users can download the latest drivers from here or via GeForce Experience. AMD users can download the latest drivers from here.
Update September 23, 2022
The latest patch, which is Patch 1.6, has fixed a lot of issues in the game. You can check out the patch notes from here.
Update 02/16/2022
The latest patch, which is the Patch 1.5, has downgraded the performance of the PC version of Cyberpunk even more. I had some footage of the game running on Patch 1.31, and I compared with the latest patch. And I realized that I was getting 6-7 FPS less on Patch 1.5. So if you are suddenly experiencing lag or fps drops in Cyberpunk 2077, after all this time. It is most probably because of the latest update. You can check out the Patch Notes of Patch 1.5 from here.
Lag and FPS Drops fix
Cyberpunk 2077 is lagging for some users, while some are experiencing random fps drops. Here are the things you can do to fix it.
Nvidia Control Panel for Cyberpunk
Try tweaking the Control Panel settings of your graphics cards. Nvidia users, open Nvidia Control Pane > click on ‘Adjust image settings with preview‘ located on the left side under 3D settings and make sure that ‘Use the advanced 3D image settings‘ is selected. Now select “Manage 3D settings” from the left bar and click on the Program Settings tab. Locate Cyberpunk 2077 from the drop-down menu under “Select a program to customize”. Once you have successfully added the game, you will then see the program settings become available for the game. Now tweak the following settings:
Threaded Optimization : On
Power Management : Prefer Maximum Performance
Low Latency Mode : Off
Vertical sync : Off
Texture filtering – Quality : Performance
AMD Control Panel settings for every card
Right-click on your desktop and click on AMD Radeon Software. Click on the Gaming tab and click on Global Graphics. Set your Graphics Profile to “eSport”. Now tweak the following settings:
- Radeon Anti-Lag : Disabled
- Radeon Chill : Disabled
- Boost : Disabled
- Image Sharpening : Disabled
- Enhanced Sync : Disabled
- Vertical Refresh : Always Off
Now click on Advanced. Tweak the following settings:
- Anti-Aliasing : Use Application settings
- Anti-aliasing Method : Multi-sampling
- Morphological Anti-Aliasing : Disabled
- Anisotropic Filtering : Disabled
- Texture Filtering Quality : Performance
- Surface Format Optimization : Enabled
- Tessellation Mode : Override application settings
- Maximum Tessellation Level : Off
- OpenGL Triple Buffering : Disabled
- GPU Workload : Graphics
Now reset the Shader Cache by hitting Performance Reset at the bottom of the list.
Tweak in-game settings
There is a chance that there isn’t any issue with the game at all. And the lag is being caused by the Graphics Settings of the game, being set too High. In that case, follow my guide to the graphics settings of Cyberpunk 2077. I have tested the game on a GTX 1650.
Power Management Plans
Set your power management settings to High Performance. Press Windows+R > Type powercfg.cpl into the Run prompt, then press Enter > Expand the Show additional plans collapsible and select High performance > If no High performance plan is available, click the Create a Power Plan button on the left > Select High performance, name your plan, and click Next > Set both of the drop-downs in this menu to Never, then click Create.
Hardware-accelerated GPU Scheduling
If you have the latest build of Windows 10 (2004) then you should make use of the brand new feature called hardware-accelerated gpu scheduling. If you have a decent graphics card then you might actually benefit from this. Here is how to turn it on:
- Type “Graphics” on the Windows search bar
- Click on the first result that shows up
- You are on the Windows graphics settings menu
- Turn on Hardware-accelerated GPU Scheduling
- Restart your PC
Graphics performance preference
The Graphics Settings menu has another awesome feature that allows you to set a graphics performance preference for a particular app. Here is how to do it:
- Set “Choose an app to set preference” to Desktop app
- Click on browse
- Go to the installation folder of Cyberpunk 2077
- Select the .exe file or the executable
- Click on Options once the .exe file is added
- Choose High Performance
- Restart your PC
Stuttering fix
Cyberpunk 2077 is stuttering for some users. Here are the things you can do to fix it.
Terminate demanding applications running in the background
If you have heavy applications running in the background, then there is a chance that the lag you are getting in Cyberpunk is being caused due some applications eating up a lot of resources. Just open your Task Manager, select the Processes tab and click on CPU. Make sure the arrow beside it is facing downwards. Doing this will pull the resource hungry applications on top. Look for the processes that you do not need, yet they are consuming a hefty chunk of the CPU. Right click on them and click on “End Task”.
Permanently remove the temporary files from your system
If you have a lot of useless files piled up inside the “Temp” folder of your system, there is a chance that it might be making your PC sluggish. Remove them all.
- Go to the Start menu on your Desktop.
- Press the Windows key and the letter R at the same time.
- Type in %TEMP% and press Enter.
- Select All (Edit > Select All or Ctrl+A).
- Click the Delete key
Windows 10 Gaming features
Microsoft has been adding a lot of “Gaming” utilities recently in Windows 10 that keep running in the background, hogging a ton of resources, without users having any idea about it.
Like Background Recording. Turn it off by heading over to the “Gaming” settings located inside the Windows Settings menu. There you should find something called “Captures” on the left. Click on it and disable the Background Recording feature inside it.
The Xbox Game Bar is another feature you need to disable. Go to Windows Settings > Gaming > Xbox Game Bar. Turn it off.
And finally the Game Mode feature, it is a complete hit or miss. In some games this features helps while it causes performance issues in some. So it is better to turn it off. Here is how to disable game mode. Open Windows 10 Settings menu > Click on Gaming > Select Game Mode from the left sidebar > Turn it off > Restart your game launcher
Overlays
Disable every single overlay that you have on right now. Overlays from applications like Discord, Nvidia GeForce Experience, Steam, etc, are known to cause issues in games. So disable all of them.
Advanced Method
Disable the Microsoft Software Protection Platform Service
[Note : This is an advanced method as it involves making changes to the Windows Registry. Do not try this unless you have proper knowledge.]
This is a step that I don’t normally recommend. But if none of the fixes above have helped you, then you can try this, I guess. A lot of Windows users probably wouldn’t know, but there is a service called Microsoft Software Protection Platform Service or (sppsvc.exe). I personally have a dual monitor setup and by paying close attention to the task manager (running on the second screen of course) I have noticed that a service called Microsoft Software Protection Platform Service keeps on popping up and starts eating a good percentage of CPU and Memory. This actually causes stuttering issues and FPS drops in heavy games.
How to disable SPPSVC
So just open your Windows Task Manager and try to observe whether a process called Microsoft Software Protection Platform Service is appearing on the list or not. If it is, then you need to temporarily pause it in order to prevent COD MW 2 from stuttering. Simply clicking ‘End Task’ on the process will do nothing, as the process will be back again in a few seconds. So here is what you need to do:
- Press Windows+R keys on your keyboard
- Type regedit and press enter to bring up the Windows Registry Editor
- Now go to this location : HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\sppsvc
- On the right-side, you will notice some options
- Double-click on Start and change its value to from 2 to 4
- Restart your PC
Keep in mind : This will disable Microsoft Software Protection Platform Service, but you won’t able to use other Microsoft Windows applications like Microsoft Word, Microsoft Powerpoint, etc. Also, you will get a message showing your windows is not activated on your desktop. When you are done playing the game, just change the value of Start back to 2. Everything will go back to normal.
I would suggest that you take a look at the official Cyberpunk 2077 Forums. You will find a lot of players discussing these exact same issues.
If you think this guide has helped you, then let us know in the comment section below. And for more Cyberpunk 2077 guides, keep an eye on Frondtech. We will be covering every single technical issue and bug of the game. Good luck!
That’s all folks!
Last Updated on September 23, 2022
Shoaib, 30, is a simple guy who loves to play video games, and enjoys new cuisines sporadically. He has been gaming since he was 7 years old, and with an experience of 22 years, under his belt, there is not a single AAA game in this world, that he hasn’t played. Despite being a MBA Graduate he decided to follow his passion. And because of his love for gaming, Frondtech came into existence.
