Game stuttering on PC.

[Kas]

Anyone got any fixes? I read somewhere that the game's not optimised for PC, but this is unbearable to play, and it's fifty quid.

[Actalo]

lock the frame-rate, turn on v-sync (only if it stops clothes flickering), turn down lighting quality, volumetrics, and reflections.

[ProperCharva]

tried everything to stop it stuttering nothing fixed it for me you just get used to it at some point

[mobucks]

It smooths out over time as you play and the data gets moved to the page file on your disk. I usually alt-tab out of the game while on a pause screen (to minimize GPU usage) because if you shut down the game most of that data will need to be reloaded next time you play causing stutters again.

[E-Commerce Meatualization Inc]

what gpu are you using?

I've noticed Nvidia players on the discussions tend to have the best luck performance wise using dx12. I have an amd and dx12 gives me microstutter all the way up to ~150fps which I didn't even think was possible, but vulkan runs smooth all the way down to 60fps in places like san denis.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Helps to flush GPU shader cache in the game folder (where it saves the system.xml file; delete the SGA files) and within your OS using Disk Cleanup (Run As Admin).

You also might have cache within %LocalAppData% > NVIDIA

Also helps to use this Launch Option in Steam for RDR2...
-cpuLoadRebalancing -useAllAvailableCores -high -ignorePipelineCache

[kreeg]

Originally posted by Resistance Is Useless (mute):

Anyone got any fixes? I read somewhere that the game's not optimised for PC, but this is unbearable to play, and it's fifty quid.

LOL

Unoptimized you say? I get 100+ FPS at 1440p with ultra settings. The game is optimized just fine!

[snowykoyuki]

get a better computer

[mobucks]

Originally posted by snowykoyuki:

get a better computer

Not really fair to say that. My rig is 7 years old and there are people having issues with rigs that are a lot newer than mine. It took me a while to fine tune everything to make it look great and run smooth, but there are so many options and settings in the game and windows that just one setting can cause the game to run poorly or crash.

My advice is to start with default settings, and increase them individually, see how the game reacts, and work up from there. Some of the advanced features might not be compatible with your hardware, or combining certain ones could cause performance to take a nosedive for the expense of barely noticeable improvement in visual quality.

[Suti]

My game was stuttering too, but it only was bc i did not have enough RAM. Now with 16gb ram it doesnt stutter at all. I recomend to atleast have 12gb ram for this game

[Siusiumajtek]

-> Delete all files named with the prefix sga_ located inside Documents\Rockstar Games\Red Dead Redemption 2\Settings.

-> Clear the Temp folder (%temp%).

-> Delete DirectX Shader Cache via Disk Cleanup.

-> Delete Shader Cache stored by Steam inside SteamLibrary\steamapps\shadercache\1174180 or 1404210.

-> Switch to Vulkan.

-> Clean re-install GPU drivers (use DDU if possible) or Roll-back to a previous version of the driver.

-> Vulkan & Steam users: Enable Shader Pre-Caching under (general) Steam Settings.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

You don't ever need that Shader PreCaching enabled in Steam and games like RDR2 never use that anyways. RDR2 creates shader cache in two places (going by when using NVIDIA GPUs) and that is here...

Documents > Rockstar Games > Red Dead Redemption 2 > Settings > all those SGA files

And also in...
%LocalAppData% > NVIDIA > within here you will notice there is cache for DirectX and OpelGL. The GL is still relevant when using Vulkan

RDR2 is set to use Vulkan by default anyways unless you manually change its setting to DX12.

If you make Graphics Settings changes, then it's good idea to wipe out all GPU Shader Cache and let the game naturally remake those Shader temp files which will happen all on its own during the following launch and enter the game world.

It helps to Pause AntiVirus or if using Defender just turn it off. It will re-enable itself later anyways.

It greatly helps to manually set the Windows PageFile for around 8GB MIN and then set the MAX to 1.5X your installed RAM. Then click Set and then Restart Windows to apply the changes. To make up for this larger static size set as the minimum set for the PageFile, you can regain that space (or more) by disable Fast Startup + Hibernation in Windows, which you can do via CMD (Run As Admin) > POWERCFG-H OFF > press enter and then restart Windows to apply the change.

[lopkiu2000]

Drivers Drivers Drivers. Update ALL drivers that you can. I was playing my third playthrough when the stuttering started. I tried every fix I could find (even the ones listed above) including reinstalling everything several times and nothing worked. I updated GPU drivers and BIOS and that didnt work. I got frustrated and unplugged my controller (Logiteck GamePad F310) then restarted the game with no controller and the stutter was gone. Replugged in the controller and stutter was back. After messing with the gamepad driver it turns out the gamepad driver was corrupt. Reinstalled it now everything works fine. Took me 6 d@mn months of frustration over a driver whose newest version is older then RDR2 itself.

EDIT
I was wrong. I played for 5 hours yesterday with no stutter and thought it was fixed. Tried to play today and Ole Mister Stutter strode valiantly into the game just to tell me to f off. I am starting to think it is a temp/cache file that needs to be deleted before playing game so it cant be recreated every time game loads. And if thats the case it needs to be deleted EVERY time before you load game.

[Sam]

Are you stuttering everywhere, or only specific locations? I get occasional stutter near towns, but nothing too bad. That is with a 4070 and a 5800x3d using Vulkan.

[lopkiu2000]

It cant be fixed. Make sure you give it a thumbs down review in steam although at this point RockStar wont care. P.S. I heard the pirated version works fine but I have not tried it.

[GamerzOne]

If on nvidia gpu try downgrading the driver to the December 2024 version. The newest driver has a listed issue with rdr2.

Seems if you have 4000 or below nvidia gpu that version is working.

You may also want to try turning off core affinity for your cpu in task manager for the game. Locking your cpu cores to the top cores and disabling e-cores if intel cpu for the game. These are things to try, that others have reported working.