I recently left MSI Afterburner running while playing the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War campaign and noticed it used around 14GB of VRAM at max settings (1440p with DLSS quality). This seemed high to me since I didn't expect COD games to use that much VRAM. After I closed the game, I checked and saw that my VRAM usage was about 2GB with just WhatsApp, Spotify, and uTorrent running. So I have a couple of questions: 1. Is it normal for an idle PC to use VRAM? 2. If a game says it requires 16GB of VRAM, does that mean my 16GB graphics card wouldn't be enough since I already have about 2GB in use even when the game isn't running? My specs are a 9600X CPU, 5070 Ti GPU, 32GB RAM, and a 2TB NVMe SSD.
3 Answers
It's entirely typical for a PC to consume VRAM when it’s idle because the GPU still needs to manage the UI and any visible content. Just know that an idle usage of around 2GB isn’t unusual at all. When you're gaming, the VRAM will be reallocated to the game as needed, so you should be fine!
1. Yes, it's normal for your PC to use some VRAM, even when idle. 2. No, you won't run into issues. There's a difference between allocated VRAM and used VRAM. When you launch a game, your GPU prioritizes the VRAM needed for the game over other tasks, clearing out what's necessary for the desktop and loading in what it needs for gaming. So, as long as you're not experiencing stuttering, you’re all good!
If you have something displayed on your screen, your system will always use some VRAM to generate that display. Just keep in mind that the operating system's VRAM usage is part of the requirements for games too!
Got it! How can I benchmark then? Should I subtract about 2GB from what MSI Afterburner shows to find out how much VRAM my game is actually using?