How to fix Borderlands 4 crashing on PC

Borderlands 4 has been plagued by system stability and stuttering issues on PC. The game is built on Unreal Engine 5, which helps it look stunning, but introduces a pattern of issues seen in other games based on the Epic Games-made development environment. Besides being "unplayable" on systems that don't meet the minimum requirements, the game has been reported to microstutter and flat out crash on systems that far exceed the hardware mandated by Gearbox.

While a day-one patch might iron out most of these issues, users have already figured out fixes to some of these issues. Let's go over the reported fixes and other general steps that work for UE5-based games in 2025.

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Community-reported fixes for Borderlands 4 stability issues

Critical Graphics Driver Fixes

Borderlands 4 is a visually stunning game plagued with launch-day optimization issues (Image via Gearbox)

For most Nvidia users, the top fix seems to be downgrading the game-ready driver version to 566.36 (December 2024) immediately. Newer driver versions, specifically those made for the RTX 50 series cards, have been reported to cause widespread crashes. Oddly enough, the issues occur specifically when you turn on DLSS Frame Generation with G-Sync.

Here are the steps to follow:

• Download DDU (Display Driver Uninstaller) and disconnect from the internet
• Run DDU in safe mode, restart PC
• Install NVIDIA 566.36 driver offline from nvidia.com/en-us/drivers
• For better stability, disable the G-Sync + Frame Generation combination entirely

AMD users can update to the latest stable/beta versions of Adrenaline without any issues. They are significantly more stable in Borderlands 4.

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Game files and system fixes

Verify game files: An important fix if you haven't tried already, we recommend gamers with fresh installations to recheck their launch files before moving to more critical fixes.

For players on Steam, follow these steps:

• Right-click Borderlands 4 → Properties → Installed Files → Verify Integrity
• Navigate to game folder → Support → Redist → VCRedist
• Install/repair all Visual C++ Redistributables (2010, 2012, 2015-2022)

Disabling overlay software like GeForce Experience and MSI Afterburner/RTSS as they conflict with UE5's rendering pipeline. Restart your PC for these changes to take effect.

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Unreal Engine 5-specific fixes for Borderlands 4

Unreal Engine 5-based games are known for performance issues (Image via Gearbox)

Unreal Engine 5's shader compilation systems are infamous for bugs on Windows. The "out of video memory" crashes during first-time loading are commonplace. Let's look at how to fix them.

Intel 13th/14th gen Raptor Lake CPU users may face a well-known bug that only occurs while running the chips at stock speeds. To fix this, follow these steps in the BIOS:

• Enter BIOS → Advanced → CPU settings
• Reduce P-Core multiplier from 55x to 53x (avoid setting a higher multiplier than the stock setting to avoid system instability)
• Save your BIOS settings and restart into Windows

Intel platform users can also set SVID Behavior to "Intel FailSafe" in XMP settings. For Unreal Engine 5 games, this has been reported to cause crash-to-desktop issues. Try enabling "Hardware-accelerated GPU Scheduling" in Windows 11 to free up CPU resources on budget systems.

Here are a few engine configuration tweaks that have been reported to work for some gamers. First, navigate to Documents\My Games\Borderlands 4\Saved\Config\WindowsNoEditor. Then, add these:

• [SystemSettings]
• r.VSync=0
• r.FrameRate.Limit=0
• r.DefaultFeature.MotionBlur=0
• NumUnusedShaderCompilingThreads=16

Further, add `-dx11` to your Steam launch options if you're on older GPUs. Forcing DirectX11 will disable DirectX12-specific features in UE5, but it may reduce stuttering.

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Hardware-specific issues in Borderlands 4

Systems meeting only the minimum requirements can't really play the game. The published minimum i7-9700/Ryzen 7 2700X and RTX 2070 with 16GB RAM has been reported to cause frequent crashes. If you have equivalent hardware, reduce graphics settings and the resolution to reduce stutters. Recommended specs (i7-12700/Ryzen 7 5800X, RTX 3080, 32GB RAM) provide stable 60fps at 1440p High settings.

The game seems to be heavy on 32 GB RAM requirements. Moreover, NVMe SSDs seem to be non-negotiable as well, with traditional hard drives and even SATA SSDs causing instability due to UE5 features like geometry streaming that require high-throughput drive read/write speeds.

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Borderlands 4 has a turbulent release, to say the least. For now, we have to wait for a Day 1 patch to iron out the issues. For now, resort to reducing visual settings, rolling back drivers, and CPU-specific tweaks. This should solve the issue for about 70% of systems.