NVIDIA Shader Cache Stuttering — How to Fix 2026
You are dealing with micro-stutters and FPS drops because your NVIDIA shader cache has become corrupted or overstuffed. Your GPU is choking on stale data leftover from old driver updates or game patches instead of running your games smoothly.
Why this happens: Nvidia stores pre-compiled shaders on disk so your GPU doesn't recompile them every launch, but after driver updates or game patches, that cache data goes stale and your GPU chokes trying to use the bad data.
What you need: No special tools are needed, though Display Driver Uninstaller is an optional alternative if manual deletion fails.
Fix Steps
1. Right click your desktop, open the NVIDIA Control Panel, and go to Manage 3D Settings.
2. Locate Shader Cache Size, set it to Off, and click Apply.
3. Reboot your computer.
4. Press Windows + R, type %userprofile%/AppData/Local, and hit Enter.
5. Open the NVIDIA folder and delete all files inside the DXCache and GLCache folders.
6. Open the NVIDIA Corporation folder and delete the contents of the NV_Cache folder if it exists.
7. Open the NVIDIA Control Panel again, set Shader Cache Size to Unlimited, and click Apply.
If that didn't work: If stuttering persists, your GPU driver installation may be completely corrupted. Use Display Driver Uninstaller to perform a clean wipe of your current drivers and perform a fresh install.
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