When War Thunder misbehaves this way, the cause is usually one of four things, and they are worth checking in order.

Short answer

Nine times out of ten it is a stale cache or an overlay injecting itself. Both are two-minute checks.

  • Run once as administrator to rule out a permissions problem.
  • Update the GPU driver, and clean-install it if this has happened before.
  • Prefer the in-game option over an external tool when both exist.

War Thunder models more of the vehicle than it tells you about, and the grind punishes guessing. Anti-cheat drivers are the one component where a plain reinstall genuinely helps. Overlays from chat apps, capture tools and storefronts all hook the same rendering path.

If it comes back

The community wisdom on this is roughly half right, and the half that is wrong costs the most time. Changing several settings at once makes the cause impossible to identify afterwards. Logs are usually more specific than the error dialog that pointed you here. Patch notes move numbers around constantly; the shape of the answer holds even when a specific value shifts.

File verification is non-destructive and repairs a surprising share of these cases. A status page tells you in five seconds what an hour of troubleshooting will not. Anything that behaves differently on console than on PC is flagged where it matters.

Overlays, and why they cause this

A crash that always happens at the same moment is a content problem, not a hardware one. It helps to understand why a step exists, because then you can adapt it when your situation is slightly different. If you are coming to this after a long break, the terminology has probably moved on.

  • Clear the shader cache if the symptom is stutter rather than a crash.
  • Check the official server status before anything else.
  • Write down what you changed, so you can undo exactly one thing if it goes sideways.
  • Verify or repair the installation through the launcher.
  • Disable every overlay, then re-enable them one at a time.
  • Read the whole sequence once before doing the first step.

Is it you or is it them

There is usually a fast way and a reliable way, and it is worth knowing which one you are choosing. Where something depends on your platform or region, that is called out rather than glossed over. What follows assumes you are on a current install and have not modified it. Treat anything stated without a version number as provisional.

Everything below is framed around the current state of War Thunder rather than a launch-week impression. Nothing here assumes a particular playstyle beyond wanting the thing to work. Most of the disagreement you will find online is two people describing different builds.

When a reinstall is justified

None of this needs a paid tool, a third-party launcher or an account on a site you have never heard of. Screenshots age faster than text, which is why this describes rather than shows. Half the pages on this topic were written for a build that no longer exists, which is why they stop matching what you see.

The awkward part is rarely the step itself, it is knowing which step comes first. The developers have changed their mind about this at least once, which explains the older advice. If a step reads as obvious, do it anyway — the obvious ones are the ones people skip and then wonder about.

The checks worth doing first

If your result differs from what is described here, note what is different first rather than starting over. Where two approaches both work, the one with fewer moving parts is the one to keep. The short version is near the top on purpose; the reasoning is there if you want to know why.

Where people go wrong

  • Assuming a guide from an older season still describes the current version.
  • Downloading a helper tool for something the game already does in its own menu.
  • Trusting a video thumbnail that promises a result the video never actually shows.
  • Rushing the last step, which is usually the one with the actual requirement in it.

War Thunder FAQ

Could my antivirus be causing this?

It can. Security software and anti-cheat both sit at the same level of the system and occasionally fight.

Does this work the same on console and PC?

The logic is identical. Menu paths and button prompts differ, and any real difference is flagged above.

Will reinstalling fix it?

Usually not, and it costs an hour. Verify the files first — that fixes the same class of problem in minutes.

Why do other guides describe this differently?

Most were written for an earlier version and never revisited. Compare the steps against what your build actually shows.

If you only take one thing from this: the answer near the top is the part that matters, the rest is context.