PUBG: Battlegrounds still runs on a customized Unreal Engine 4, and its stutter has a very particular shape. The classic case is the landing hitch: you jump from the plane, textures and buildings stream in as you descend, and the frame rate stalls for a second or two just as you reach the ground. That is texture streaming and disk speed, not your GPU. The second common case is a rhythmic micro-stutter throughout the match that shows up on a frame time graph as regular spikes, which usually traces to a frame limiter and V-Sync fighting, an overlay, or one of the two anti-cheat layers the game runs (BattlEye and Krafton’s own Zakynthos) taking a CPU slice at the wrong moment. The third is a one-time hitch on each new event, such as the first grenade explosion or vehicle sound, which is shader and asset caching after a patch. Each fix below targets one of those patterns. Check GameUserSettings.ini and Task Manager before changing anything, because the wrong fix for the wrong stutter will accomplish nothing in 2026.
- Likely Causes
- Fix 1: Remove old launch options
- Fix 2: Fix the frame limiter and V-Sync
- Fix 3: Clear the shader and asset caches
- Fix 4: Disable overlays and background recorders
- Fix 5: Move the install to an NVMe SSD and lower texture quality
- Fix 6: Trim CPU-heavy settings
- Fix 7: Reset GameUserSettings.ini
- Fix 8: Repair BattlEye
- Fix 9: Separate network stutter from render stutter
- If Nothing Works
- FAQ
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Likely Causes
| Cause | How to confirm | Fix difficulty |
|---|---|---|
| Texture streaming from a slow drive | Heavy hitch on landing and when entering new cities; game on HDD or SATA SSD | Moderate |
| Frame limiter and V-Sync conflict | Regular spikes on frame time graph despite high average FPS | Easy |
| Stale shader cache after a patch | One-time hitches on first use of weapons and effects | Easy |
| Overlays and capture software | Stutter disappears with Discord, Afterburner and Game Bar off | Easy |
| Texture quality exceeding VRAM | Dedicated GPU memory pinned at the limit in Task Manager | Easy |
| Anti-cheat CPU contention on low core counts | CPU usage near 100 percent on four-core systems | Moderate |
| Deprecated launch options | Launch Options field contains old flags copied from guides | Easy |
| Network jitter to the match server | Players warp while frame time stays smooth | Moderate |
Fix 1: Remove old launch options
How to check
In Steam, right-click PUBG, Properties, and read the Launch Options field. Years of forum advice left many players with strings like -USEALLAVAILABLECORES -malloc=system -sm4. Some of these no longer do anything; -sm4 in particular is blocked by the anti-cheat and can cause instability rather than help.
What to do
Clear the Launch Options field entirely. If you rely on a specific refresh rate in fullscreen, the only widely useful flag remaining is -refresh 144 (substitute your monitor’s rate). Test a full match with an empty field first.
How to undo it
Re-enter any flag you want to test individually.
Fix 2: Fix the frame limiter and V-Sync
How to check
Open Settings, Graphics, Advanced, and look at Frame Rate Limit and V-Sync. The options are Smoothed, Display-Based, Unlimited and Custom. Enable your GPU overlay’s frame time graph; if it shows an even sawtooth pattern while average FPS is fine, the limiter is the problem.
What to do
If you use G-Sync or FreeSync, set V-Sync off in game, set Frame Rate Limit to Custom at about three frames below your refresh rate, and enable V-Sync only in the driver control panel. On a fixed-refresh monitor, use Display-Based. Avoid Smoothed, which targets the refresh rate but can introduce its own uneven pacing. Set the separate Lobby frame limit to 60 so the GPU is not spinning at full load between matches.
How to undo it
Restore the previous limiter and V-Sync choices.
Fix 3: Clear the shader and asset caches
How to check
If the stutter began after a game update or GPU driver install and appears once per new weapon or effect, cached shaders need rebuilding.
What to do
Close Steam. Delete Steam\steamapps\shadercache\578080. On NVIDIA, clear %LOCALAPPDATA%\NVIDIA\DXCache; on AMD, %LOCALAPPDATA%\AMD\DxCache. Restart Steam, launch PUBG, and play a Training Mode session to warm the cache before ranked matches.
How to undo it
Nothing to revert.
Fix 4: Disable overlays and background recorders
How to check
Discord’s overlay, the Steam overlay, RivaTuner, the NVIDIA App overlay and Xbox Game Bar’s background recording all hook the game. PUBG’s anti-cheat also scans injected modules, which adds cost when several are present.
What to do
Disable each overlay and turn off Game Bar background recording in Windows Settings, Gaming, Captures. Test a match with none running.
How to undo it
Re-enable one at a time and stop when the stutter returns.
Fix 5: Move the install to an NVMe SSD and lower texture quality
How to check
Right-click PUBG in Steam, Properties, Installed Files, and note the drive. If it is a hard drive or an older SATA SSD, the landing hitch is expected. Also watch Dedicated GPU memory in Task Manager during a city fight; if it sits at the card’s limit, textures are being evicted and reloaded.
What to do
Use Steam’s Move Install Folder option to relocate the game to an NVMe drive. In Settings, Graphics, set Texture to High rather than Ultra on 8 GB cards. These two changes together remove most landing and city-entry hitching.
How to undo it
Move the install back and raise Texture again.
Fix 6: Trim CPU-heavy settings
How to check
Watch total CPU usage in Task Manager during a hot drop. On six-core and older CPUs, PUBG’s game thread plus two anti-cheat services can saturate the processor and produce hitching that lower graphics settings will not fix.
What to do
Set Shadows and Effects to Low, since both add CPU-side draw work, and set View Distance to Medium, which reduces object culling cost. Set Windows power mode to Best performance and close background applications. Do not attempt to disable or suspend the anti-cheat processes; doing so causes disconnects or bans.
How to undo it
Raise the settings in the Graphics menu.
Fix 7: Reset GameUserSettings.ini
How to check
PUBG stores settings in %LOCALAPPDATA%\TslGame\Saved\Config\WindowsNoEditor\GameUserSettings.ini. Old hand edits, especially to streaming or pool size values, can persist across patches and hurt frame pacing.
What to do
Close the game. Rename the file to GameUserSettings.ini.bak. Launch to regenerate defaults, then rebuild your settings through the menu rather than restoring the old file. If you have set the file to read-only in the past, remove that attribute first so the game can write to it.
How to undo it
Delete the regenerated file and rename the backup back.
Fix 8: Repair BattlEye
How to check
If stutter comes with brief freezes, kicks or a BattlEye dialog at launch, the anti-cheat service may be damaged.
What to do
Close Steam. Run Steam\steamapps\common\PUBG\TslGame\Binaries\Win64\BattlEye\Uninstall_BattlEye.bat as administrator, then Install_BattlEye.bat from the same folder. Add the PUBG folder to your antivirus exclusions. Launch through Steam.
How to undo it
Not applicable; the repair restores the default state.
Fix 9: Separate network stutter from render stutter
How to check
If the frame time graph is smooth but enemies teleport or shots register late, the problem is your connection or the match server, not the client.
What to do
Use Ethernet, disable VPNs, pause downloads, and in Settings, Gameplay, make sure your preferred region is selected rather than letting matchmaking send you across an ocean.
How to undo it
Restore the previous network setup.
If Nothing Works
Verify game files in Steam and clean-install your GPU driver, then repeat Fix 3 because a driver update invalidates shaders. Record a frame time capture in Training Mode, where there is no server load and few players, and compare it with a live match; a smooth Training Mode result means the remaining stutter is network or server-side. Test a fresh Windows user account and a session with no third-party software. If the stutter arrived with a specific patch and many players report it, check Krafton’s known issues post; some stutter regressions have been engine-side and were addressed by later updates.
FAQ
Why does PUBG stutter when I land?
Buildings and textures stream in as you descend. A faster drive and Texture at High rather than Ultra reduce the landing hitch considerably.
Should I still use -USEALLAVAILABLECORES?
No. Modern builds manage threads on their own, and stale launch flags are a frequent cause of odd behavior. Clear the field.
Does the anti-cheat cause stutter?
It adds CPU overhead, most noticeable on four- and six-core processors. Reducing other background load and CPU-heavy settings offsets it; disabling it is not an option.
Is Smoothed frame rate limit a good idea?
Usually not. A Custom cap slightly below your refresh rate with driver-side V-Sync gives more even frame pacing on adaptive-sync monitors.
Ready to decide? Our #1 pick for 2026 is the Texture streaming from a slow drive.
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