Elden Ring Infinite Loading Screen Fix for RTX 5080 / 5090 & RX 8000 — The 2026 Ray Tracing Patch

Yes — and this is the single most overlooked cause of the 2026 Elden Ring loading issue. Windows 11 version 24H2 made Auto-HDR active by default on compatible HDR monitors. When Elden Ring starts loading, it kicks off a DX12 Ray Tracing shader compilation routine. At the same moment, Auto-HDR is trying to negotiate VRAM access through Windows HDR metadata processing.

These two processes collide at the VRAM allocation layer, and the result is a silent freeze — the loading bar stops, usually around 60%, and never moves again.

This stall is a two-part problem. First, the 1.14 patch changed the shader cache format — any existing cache from before the patch is now mismatched. Second, the shader compilation itself is hanging due to the Auto-HDR + VRAM conflict.

The complete fix has three parts:

1. Edit %AppData%\Roaming\EldenRing\GraphicsConfig.xml and set RayTracingQuality to OFF.
2. Delete the old shader cache at %LocalAppData%\EldenRing\shader — delete the contents of that folder, not the folder itself.
3. Disable Auto-HDR in Windows Display Settings.

Do all three, then launch. Your loading bar will move past 60% and complete normally.

The specific entry is <RayTracingQuality>. When this is set to HIGH or ULTRA and Auto-HDR is simultaneously active, the DX12 context gets destroyed before the game window even appears — producing a pure white screen with no error message.

Open %AppData%\Roaming\EldenRing\GraphicsConfig.xml in Notepad, find that line, and change it to:

<RayTracingQuality>OFF</RayTracingQuality>

Also check for any <HDRMode> entry and set it to 0 if present. Save, close Notepad, and disable Windows Auto-HDR before launching.

Yes. The RTX 50 series uses DLSS 4’s Multi-Frame Generation — a fundamentally different architecture than the DLSS 3 Frame Generation on RTX 40 series. Elden Ring’s 1.14 patch added Ray Tracing support but was not designed with RTX 50 series Multi-Frame Gen in mind.

The result is shader load stutters during the loading screen and, in some cases, a complete freeze. You may also see micro-stutters in busy combat areas even after loading.

AMD’s Adrenalin March 2026 update changed the initialization sequence of Smart Access Memory (also called Resizable BAR). Previously, SAM activated after the GPU was fully initialized. In the new Adrenalin version, SAM negotiation happens earlier — during the DX12 resource allocation phase.

Elden Ring’s loading routine was written before this change and doesn’t handle this early negotiation correctly. It gets stuck waiting for a VRAM allocation that SAM has already partially claimed.

Yes — in our testing, DDU clean install was the single most reliable fix for persistent loading issues that survived the XML edit alone. Here’s exactly what to do:

1. Download DDU (Display Driver Uninstaller) free from Guru3D.
2. Hold Shift and click Restart → Troubleshoot → Advanced Options → Startup Settings → Safe Mode with Networking.
3. Run DDU, select your GPU brand, click “Clean and Restart.”
4. After restarting, install NVIDIA v572.42 or AMD Adrenalin March 2026 with “Factory Reset” selected.

Almost certainly yes — your save file is almost definitely not gone. When Elden Ring crashes or is force-closed during loading, Steam Cloud doesn’t always get the chance to properly sync your local save data. The next launch may show an older save or appear to show nothing at all.

Quick fix: In Steam, right-click Elden Ring → Properties → Updates → Steam Cloud → click “Manage” or “Force Sync.”

If that option isn’t visible, your save file is almost certainly still sitting locally at:
C:\Users\[YourName]\AppData\Roaming\EldenRing\[YourSteamID]\

The safe window is after your first successful Site of Grace save. Here’s why that specific moment matters: once you’ve reached a Site of Grace, the game has completed its initial shader compilation cycle and written a valid cache to disk. Future loads will read from this cache instead of recompiling from scratch — so the VRAM handshake conflict that caused the original stall no longer occurs.

To re-enable: in-game Settings → Graphics → Ray Tracing Quality. We recommend going Low → Medium → High rather than jumping straight to High, just to confirm stability at each step.

Yes, absolutely. Once the game has loaded and you’ve made your first save at a Site of Grace, Ray Tracing is safe to re-enable. The initial stall only happens because shader compilation runs for the first time with the new 1.14 cache format. After that first save, the compiled shaders are stored correctly and future loads skip the compilation step entirely.

Go to Settings → Graphics → Ray Tracing Quality and set it to your preferred level. On NVIDIA v572.42 stable, we tested Low, Medium, and High without any loading issues on subsequent loads.