The game mode of Windows 10 is actually intended to "achieve a more stable frame rate depending on the game and system," as it says on the official Windows support website. However, the feature on Windows 10 currently does the opposite for some players.
Game Mode causes stutters and problems
Several players are currently reporting on reddit that disabling game mode fixed performance issues in games.
It often appears to be activated by default without the players knowing about it. Accordingly, many have probably not yet considered it as a possible source of problems.
What difficulties are players currently complaining about? Various PC players write on reddit that when Game Mode was activated, they had to contend with stutters and completely frozen screens in various titles (including Call of Duty: Warzone, League of Legends and Destiny 2).
The problems apparently occur with both AMD and Nvidia graphics cards, according to user reports, affected GPUs so far contain these models:
So you deactivate the game mode
If you notice unusually poor performance in games, you should check whether Game Mode is activated in Windows 10. If this is the case, deactivating the feature may solve the performance problems.
To the Turn off game mode, do the following:
- Calls up the Windows settings (Windows key -> gear in the bottom left of the menu).
- Navigates to the menu Play and then click on the bar on the left Game mode.
- Deactivate the game mode by moving the slider on Out poses.
Why exactly deactivating the game mode can fix problems for some players is unclear. However, this also applies to the functionality of the game mode, which Microsoft has not commented on for a long time.
We tried Game Mode 2017 for the first time when it was added to Microsoft's Insider Preview, and further tests followed in 2018. According to our measurements, it did not make any major differences at that time.
If you have had your own experience with game mode, please tell us about it in the comments.
