What Causes Screen Flickering in Windows 11?
Screen flickering mostly occurs due to outdated graphics drivers and incompatible apps. We have detailed the possible causes for screen flickering on your Windows 11 PC along with their fixes in this guide. If it is not due to a hardware failure, you can fix the screen flickering with some easy troubleshooting measures. It includes disconnecting cables and reconnecting them, restarting the machine, and changing the screen refresh rate. Read on till the end for all possible ways to fix screen flickering in Windows 11.
Methods to Fix Screen Flickering in Windows 11 (2021)
Check the Cables of Your Monitor
Before moving to various troubleshooting measures, the easiest way to fix screen flickering in Windows 11 is to check if you have properly connected the display cable to your monitor. You could try unplugging the monitor from your PC and connecting it back again. If you are using a laptop, make sure the hinge is not broken or damaged, as it is one potential cause for screen flickering.
Change Accent Color and Background to Fix Windows 11 Screen Flickering
Windows 10 is known to cause screen flickering issues when you let the OS pick the accent color from your wallpaper. Unfortunately, this issue is still present in Windows 11, and you should avoid using automatic accent color in Windows 11 to fix the screen flickering issue. This method is helpful if you use slideshow wallpapers. Follow the steps below to turn off automatic accent colors and slideshow wallpapers:
- Open Settings with the Windows 11 keyboard shortcut Win+I and switch to the “Personalization” section from the left sidebar. Now, click on “Colors” to access personalization settings.
- From this settings page, click on “Accent color” and choose “Manual”. You are now all set, and this solution should hopefully fix screen flicking issues on Windows 11.
- If that doesn’t do the trick, you can try disabling the “Slideshow” wallpaper option. To disable the slideshow wallpaper setting, click on “Background” under Personalization settings.
- Click on the dropdown list to the right of “Personalize your background” and choose Picture or Solid color as the background. In other words, you should disable slideshow wallpapers to get rid of strange screen flickering on Windows 11.
Disable Animation Effects to Solve Screen Flickering in Windows 11
Another potential fix for the screen flickering issue is to disable the animation effects on your Windows 11 PC. Check the steps to turn off animation effects in Windows 11 below:
2. All you have to do now is turn off the “Animation effects” toggle. And you’re done. Try using your Windows 11 PC and check if you are still facing the screen flickering issue. If this didn’t fix the problem, try out other methods mentioned below.
Disable Hardware Acceleration to Fix Screen Flickering in Chrome
Users report that disabling hardware acceleration helps to fix the screen flickering issue. In this guide, we have detailed the steps to disable hardware acceleration in Google Chrome. You can check this guide for instructions to disable hardware acceleration on Edge and Firefox.
- After opening the Chrome browser, click on the vertical three dots menu icon at the top right corner and choose Settings.
- Switch to the “System” tab under “Advanced” settings from the left sidebar and turn off the “Use hardware acceleration when available” toggle. Now, restart Chrome and you will no longer face any screen flickering issues.
Update Display Drivers to Resolve Windows 11 Screen Flickering
If none of the solutions above helped you fix the problem, you could try the classic troubleshooting method — updating drivers. In this case, you should update the display and graphics drivers to fix the screen flickering issue. Here’s how you can update your graphics drivers on Windows 11.
- Use the Windows 11 keyboard shortcut Win+R to open the Run window and type “devmgmt.msc” to open Device Manager.
- Expand the Display adapters section and right-click on the graphics card of your PC. From the dialog box that appears, choose the “Update driver” option to update your display drivers.
- When the pop-up menu appears, you can choose to automatically search for drivers on the Internet or manually locate and install these drivers from your PC. You could also check for driver updates from the Settings app under the “Optional updates” section of the “Windows Update” page.
The steps above highlight the standard method for updating graphics drivers. For drivers specific to popular OEMs like HP, Dell, Asus, and more, feel free to check our detailed guide on updating drivers on Windows.
Uninstall Incompatible Apps to Stop Screen Flickering
There’s a chance that a recently installed incompatible app is causing the screen flickering issue on your Windows 11 PC. We suggest you try uninstalling apps you installed just before the flickering issue started to stop it. Here’s how to uninstall apps on Windows 11:
2. To make it easier to locate the app you installed recently, click on the “Sort by” dropdown list and choose the Last installed option.
3. Now, click on the three dots menu next to each app’s name and choose “Uninstall” to remove an application that might be causing the screen to flicker from your Windows 11 PC.
Adjust Refresh Rate to Fix Windows 11 Screen Flickering
- Open the Settings app and click on Display.
- Scroll down until you find the Advanced display setting under “Related settings”.
- You will now see the option to “Choose a refresh rate“. Click on the dropdown list next to this option and try switching to a different screen refresh rate. If the screen flickering issue was due to your monitor’s refresh rate, this method should fix that.
Fix Screen Flickering on Windows 11
So these are a few nifty methods you can try out to fix screen flickering on Windows 11. We hope this guide helped you get rid of annoying screen flickering issues on your Windows 11 PC. While you are at it, do check out our in-depth guides on how to debloat Windows 11 and how to speed up Windows 11 to ensure a smooth user experience.
