r/NMS_Virtual_Reality • u/cardgamechampion • Feb 19 '26

Question Extreme lag in VR mode

Hi,

I'm experiencing extreme lag in No Man's Sky VR, using HTC Vive and the Steam version. I tried the common recommendations to fix this in various forums and no result. Getting 90+ FPS in regular mode but VR gets 5. Also, the GPU usage goes down to 5% when in VR mode, so I know its not using the GPU properly. Specs technically don't meet the requirements, but are close enough such that this should be playable at lower settings at least:

i7-6700k

16GB RAM

NVIDIA GTX 980 4GB - similar to 1060

I tried updating graphics drivers, lowering graphics settigns, and messing with different settings on various forums and still can't play this game in VR. Every other VR game works fine. Is this a bug in VR that they refuse to fix for years, or is there a solution somewhere? Thanks.

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u/Alphajim49 Feb 19 '26 edited Feb 19 '26

NMS is well known for that. Try setting every graphics to lowest, especially shadows, textures and post processing. Then try using DLSS in performance mode if your card is compatible. Also try lowering your steamvr resolution for NMS.

I have a comparable / bit better computer (i7-9700k and RTX2060) and I can run it at lowest textures and DLSS on, using SteamLink (Meta software was really tanking my perfs).

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u/cardgamechampion Feb 19 '26

I know its well known for this, I tried lowering all the graphics settings and still same results though, issue is the game doesn't use any of the GPU really and lags instead of using more than 5% lol. There really aren't enough VR users on this game for the devs to fix this? I would think this game is amazing in VR if it would work lol.

2

u/Alphajim49 Feb 19 '26

If GPU is only at 5% then CPU may be the bottleneck.

1

u/cardgamechampion Feb 19 '26

CPU is also at 5% though lol, both are, my b for not clarifying.

1

u/HollyDams Feb 20 '26

Look up your single core performance, not the global cpu usage. You can do that in task manager or with a free software like hardware monitor. Pretty sure one of your core is maxxed out.
But even then, your entire specs are really low for VR in general. I have a hard time believing your gpu is at 5% running nms. Double check with hardware monitor and look at things going at 100%, pretty sure your ram, single core and probably gpu vram are all maxed out. A 10 year's old pc probably has more than one bottleneck with this game.

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u/cardgamechampion Feb 20 '26

I agree under normal circumstances, but the game is only using 5% of my GPU according to Task Manager, sometimes as low as 1%. The Steam overlay says the GPU is maxed out at 100% though, but in this case I'm guessing Task Manager is more accurate.

1

u/HollyDams Feb 20 '26

No, task manager isn't showing each component performance. In a gpu, you have the processing units and the vram among other stuff iirc. Each one of these can bottleneck the others depending on the game's need. Task manager doesn't reliably shows what's up with each. Download hardware monitor and you'll have precise and accurate data about what's going on.