Why Valorant freezes: what to do to optimize the game for a weak and powerful computer

Valorant is a fairly new game, so there are still a lot of bugs, errors at launch. The situation is not an exception when Valorant lags (freezes, slows down) not only on a weak, but also on a powerful PC.

Why Freeze Valorant

There are a lot of reasons why Valorant can slow down a lot. For example:

• too much load on the central and graphic processor, lack of RAM due to a mismatch between the characteristics of the computer and the system requirements of the game;
• a large number of running programs and running processes in the background, in addition to the game, which eat up part of the requirements;
• for some users, Valorant does not work well precisely because of the Vanguard anti-cheat, without which it will not be possible to play at all;
• old versions of installed Windows components and video card drivers.

What to do with lags

1. First, just restart your PC, perhaps the scheduled installation of downloaded updates hangs in the tasks.
2. Close all programs except for the game itself and the running Vanguard anti-cheat system. This is especially true for resource-intensive programs, such as Internet browsers, skype, antiviruses and others.
3. Go to the task manager (combination "Ctrl + Shift + Esc"). Open the Processes tab. Look at the "CPU" and "Memory" columns. If there are any running processes that take up a lot of resources, end them, but only if you know exactly what kind of program it is.Also look at the Startup tab, which displays programs that start when Windows boots. We recommend disabling startup items as much as possible, leaving only the essentials.Restart the computer.
4. Free up space on the drive where Valorant is installed. The game weighs about 8,5 GB, and with subsequent updates, the amount of space occupied may increase significantly. Therefore, it is recommended to allocate at least one and a half to two times more space on the drive.
5. For the duration of the game or permanently, you can disable the visual effects in Windows, which also load the video card. Click on the shortcut "My Computer", go to "Properties". Then do everything as shown in the screenshot below.
6. Many modern computers run on two drives. The first is a solid-state drive (SSD), which is designed to install only the operating system and programs on it. The second is the hard drive, designed to store the rest of the files subject to permanent deletion, overwriting. SSD is much faster than HDD, so it is recommended to install it on the first one.
7. Do a hard defrag. Right-click on the disk icon, open properties. Next, go to the "Service" tab and defragment along with optimization. Sometimes such actions can remove lags. You can't defragment an SSD.
8. Clean Windows of junk files and accumulated cache. Use CCleaner. For the task at hand, the free version of the software is enough.
9. Install the latest updates for your graphics card and Windows components.

Valorant optimization

To effectively remove friezes, especially if the PC is very weak, only graphics degradation will help - a decrease in image quality both in the game, and setting the video card for a specific program. In our case, Valorant.

In more detail, all the nuances are described in our other article: how to increase fps in valorant.

On a powerful PC, lags are unlikely to be related to the characteristics of the iron. Most likely, the problem is in Windows or some active programs that conflict with the game, and specifically with Vanguard, which is heavily integrated into the system and can block the operation of components.

1. We advise you to clean the system, disable all security programs, antiviruses, firewalls, remove programs from startup, restart Windows and try to play again. Perhaps the friezes will disappear and the FPS will increase.
2. When using the Discord chatting program, disable the overlay, which is not used as often and consumes a lot of resources.
3. The radical decision will be complete removal of Valorant and anti-cheat with subsequent installation from scratch.

For very weak computers, it is sometimes recommended to disable standard components that you may never use in Windows. For example, the print service, standard Windows games, and others. Such services and components practically do not load the PC, but in combination with other optimization actions, they can have a small effect.