Bad news for PC gamers running the Windows 11 22H2 Update: You might encounter some sluggish performance due to a software bug.
Microsoft started rolling out the Windows 11 22H2 update in September. But on Thursday, Microsoft issued a warning on its support page: “Some games and apps might experience lower than expected performance or stuttering on Windows 11, version 22H2,” the company wrote.
For some reason, Windows 11 can trigger additional software processes while gaming, which can drag down performance. “Affected games and apps are inadvertently enabling GPU performance debugging features not meant to be used by consumers,” Microsoft says.
The company is working on a fix, which will arrive in a new release for Windows 11 22H2. In the meantime, Redmond has applied a “compatibility hold on devices affected by this issue from being offered or installing Windows 11, version 22H2.”
The company has also offered a workaround, which involves updating the affected games and apps to their latest versions, and hoping the issue is fixed. Microsoft didn’t say much else, including which GPUs or hardware configurations can be affected.
Anecdotally, some users have been reporting serious lag issues since updating to the latest version of Windows 11. “I just updated to 22H2 and I am dealing with extremely unstable FPS in all my games. I have good specs for gaming and have previously never seen any issues,” wrote one user back in September.
In some cases, the performance drops were due to Nvidia’s GeForce Experience software, which has since been fixed. AMD also says it’s aware of reports indicating Windows 11 causing “unexpected performance deltas in certain games” with Ryzen 7000 series desktop processors.
Whether Microsoft has uncovered a new issue in the OS remains unclear. But the performance drops may cause users to steer clear of Windows 11 22H2 until the company irons out the issues. Microsoft didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.