How to disable hardware acceleration on Microsoft Edge

If Edge Chromium is having issues displaying visual elements on the screen, disabling hardware acceleration may fix the problem – here's how.

Edge disable hardware acceleration
Edge disable hardware acceleration

Microsoft Edge comes with hardware acceleration, a feature that enables the browser to access the graphics card on the device to speed up specific tasks to improve the overall user experience. However, hardware acceleration can negatively affect the experience depending on your computer configuration by preventing visual elements from displaying correctly.

If you get menus and dialog boxes not rendering correctly, a green screen appears when playing a video on Microsoft Edge, or there are rendering issues on a virtual machine, disabling hardware acceleration can resolve the problem.

This guide will teach you the steps to disable hardware acceleration in the Chromium version of Microsoft Edge on Windows 10 or 11.

Disable hardware acceleration on Microsoft Edge

To disable hardware acceleration on Microsoft Edge, use these steps:

  1. Open Microsoft Edge.

  2. Click the Settings and More (three-dotted) button on the top-right corner.

  3. Click on Settings.

  4. Click on System.

  5. Under the “System” section, turn off the Use hardware acceleration when available toggle switch.

    Hardware acceleration disabled

    Quick tip: If you are not able to navigate the settings due to visual rendering problems, you can use this path to access the system settings: edge://settings/system.
  6. Click the Restart button.

Once you complete the steps, menus and visual elements should render correctly in the Chromium version of Microsoft Edge.

About the author

Mauro Huculak is a Windows How-To Expert who started Pureinfotech in 2010 as an independent online publication. He has also been a Windows Central contributor for nearly a decade. Mauro has over 14 years of experience writing comprehensive guides and creating professional videos about Windows and software, including Android and Linux. Before becoming a technology writer, he was an IT administrator for seven years. In total, Mauro has over 20 years of combined experience in technology. Throughout his career, he achieved different professional certifications from Microsoft (MSCA), Cisco (CCNP), VMware (VCP), and CompTIA (A+ and Network+), and he has been recognized as a Microsoft MVP for many years. You can follow him on X (Twitter), YouTube, LinkedIn and About.me.