How To Update Nvidia Geforce Drivers

How to update Nvidia drivers

(Paradigm credit: Nvidia)

If you ain an Nvidia GPU, count yourself lucky — they're pretty scarce these days! Notwithstanding, owning an Nvidia GeForce GTX or RTX graphics carte du jour is only half the boxing.

If yous want your games to run at the all-time possible settings, you'll need to keep the device'south drivers up to date. Nvidia releases new driver software frequently, and these updates can mean the divergence betwixt a game that runs well, and a game that runs spectacularly well.

Thankfully, updating Nvidia drivers is extremely simple, provided you lot take the right software. In one case you download the Nvidia GeForce Experience software, only two clicks stand up between you and having upwards-to-appointment drivers. There are other, more than complicated ways to update your drivers, but you generally don't take to worry about them, unless you run into technical difficulties somewhere along the manner.

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Read on to acquire how to update your Nvidia drivers. Then, you can get dorsum to your game — which may look and run improve than before.

How to update Nvidia drivers

1. Download the Nvidia GeForce Experience software

While there are other ways to go Nvidia drivers (Windows Update, Device Managing director, scouring Nvidia'southward website), for about users, the GeForce Feel software represents the fastest and simplest method.

Without going into exhaustive detail, GeForce Feel offers new drivers before Windows does, and too optimizes your games afterward. You can as well choose between game- and studio-optimized drivers, depending on whether you're a gamer or a graphic designer.

Nvidia GeForce how-to — (Image credit: Hereafter)

To get the software, visit the Nvidia GeForce Experience website, click Download At present and install the program. This part of the process is pretty foolproof.

ii. Check for updates

Fair warning: When yous first launch the GeForce Experience software, you'll need to ready an Nvidia account to utilise all of its features. This isn't really worth a full walkthrough, though; if you lot've ever set up an online account before, the steps here are similar.

Just be sure to follow all the standard safe protocols here: don't reuse old passwords, do activate 2FA, and and so along. (Check out our guide on how to create potent passwords.)

From there, you'll want to navigate to the Drivers tab and select Cheque for updates. If y'all've had the program open up for a few minutes, it may take already checked for a driver automatically. Either manner, if there's a new driver available, y'all'll see a green Download button.

3. Select your commuter type (optional)

If you bought your Nvidia GPU primarily for gaming, you're proficient to go. However, if you lot're a graphic designer, you'll have to become through one additional pace. Instead of installing the default driver, you'll want to click on the three vertical periods next to the Check for updates box.

Hither, you'll be able to select between a Game-ready driver and a Studio driver. The one-time is geared toward gaming; the latter is geared toward creative apps. You can take only one installed at a fourth dimension, but you can switch dorsum and forth equally needed.

4. Download and install your driver

Once you have your driver selected, all yous have to exercise is click Download. The drivers are usually a few hundred megabytes, so depending on your connection, this part of the process shouldn't take long.

Installation is besides quite simple, although yous practice take to make one choice forth the fashion. Express Installation installs whatsoever Nvidia deems useful, including extra software that you lot may or may not desire (audio drivers, PhysX features, etc.). Custom Installation lets yous pick and choose what yous want.

Express Installation is a good choice for well-nigh people, provided that storage space isn't at a premium on your computer. But if y'all go with the Custom choice, you can always reinstall optional features subsequently, so there's no existent downside in that location, either.

That'southward all yous take to practise. The Nvidia GeForce Experience software will accept care of the residual. So long every bit y'all kick up the software and check for new updates in one case every few weeks or so, your GPU should run at peak performance for a long fourth dimension to come.

Alternate driver update methods

As mentioned, the Nvidia GeForce Experience software isn't the just way to update your Nvidia drivers. You can also do so through Windows Update or Device Manager, although Windows doesn't annals new updates until weeks after Nvidia puts them out initially.

If you lot're having trouble installing a new driver, nonetheless, your best choice is to use Nvidia's website directly. Here, yous tin use a series of dropdown menus to select your GPU, then download and install the commuter update directly.

The methodology here is pretty self-explanatory, but be sure to run dxdiag if you lot're unsure of which GPU you have. (Type "dxdiag" into the Windows search bar and run the program that pops up. Your GPU information will be under the Brandish tab.)

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Marshall Honorof is a senior editor for Tom'due south Guide, overseeing the site's coverage of gaming hardware and software. He comes from a scientific discipline writing background, having studied paleomammalogy, biological anthropology, and the history of science and technology. Later hours, you tin find him practicing taekwondo or doing deep dives on classic sci-fi.