Severe stuttering and FPS drops since patch 7.3

Hello,

I am reaching out because I’ve been experiencing consistent stuttering and FPS drops while playing since the release of patch 7.3. The issue occurs almost exclusively during peak hours (approximately 15:00–02:00 Server Time) and manifests as recurring brief freezes or FPS drops every few seconds, with frame rates falling from ~60–50 down to ~30–32 for about 1–2 seconds, in some cases lasting up to 10 seconds, before returning to normal. Outside of these hours, the game runs perfectly fine. I was hoping that this would be solved with the release of the current patch, but sadly in its current state, the game has been effectively unplayable for months.

I have played FFXIV for over a year from Chile, South America without ever experiencing this problem. It started immediately after patch 7.3 and has persisted since then, including after patch 7.4. The issue occurs even when using a wired Ethernet connection and even with all graphical settings set to the lowest possible values.

I tested on multiple Worlds (on both Chaos and Light Data Centers) and even traveled to Materia (Oceania) to rule out a Data Center-specific issue. However the problem persists in all cases, occurring in every single place: inside crowded cities, during duties, inside inns, and even when my character is completely idle and alone in isolated or instanced areas with no other players nearby. In these situations, FPS remain perfectly stable before peak hours, but once the issue window begins, FPS drops continue to occur despite minimal rendering load and no player activity.

A very consistent pattern I’ve observed is that the problem begins around the Daily Reset time (15:00 ST), which coincides with approximately 12:00 Chilean Summer Time. Before the Daily Reset, the game runs smoothly for hours. After it, FPS drops begin and worsen as player activity increases, especially on weekends.

Importantly, these drops affect FPS only, not ping. Network latency remains stable while the client experiences sudden frame drops, which suggests this is not a typical network lag or packet loss issue. Monitoring system performance shows that during these stuttering moments, GPU usage temporarily drops, as if the client is briefly stalled or waiting on another process.

Additionally, this behavior is not present in any other game, application, or workload on my system. Outside of FFXIV, my hardware performs normally under sustained load, including other online games and more GPU-intensive applications. System temperatures, clocks, and utilization remain stable, and no similar FPS drops or stuttering occur elsewhere. This further indicates that the issue is specific to FFXIV and not related to hardware instability or system-wide performance problems.

I already contacted my ISP (VTR Chile) multiple times, and after several days of investigation, they confirmed there are no issues within their domestic network. I also ran WinMTR tests to the European data centers and observed some occasional latency spikes and packet loss only after international hops (around Miami / Twelve99 network), which should be normal considering the distance. However, the FPS drops occur independently of latency fluctuations and persist even when latency is stable, reinforcing that this is not a local or ISP-related issue.


While I initially suspected routing congestion, the fact that:
• the issue started immediately after patch 7.3,
• occurs across multiple Worlds and Data Centers (including Materia),
• affects FPS only (not ping),
• happens even when completely alone and idle,
• and consistently coincides with the Daily Reset / peak activity window,

strongly suggests a client-side issue or background synchronization process introduced in patch 7.3 that becomes active during peak hours, rather than a local network or hardware problem.

I would greatly appreciate it if your team could check whether there are any known client-side issues, background processes, or backend interactions introduced in patch 7.3 that could be causing these FPS stalls during peak hours, particularly for players connecting from South America or with my system specifications.

Below is a detailed list of all troubleshooting steps I have already performed.


Troubleshooting performed

- Tested with both Wi-Fi and Ethernet (same result).

- Made sure to run both FFXIV.exe and launcher as administrator.

- Updated Microsoft Edge and reset settings to default.

- Updated and rolled back NVIDIA drivers.

- Updated all CPU, chipset, and network drivers.

- Unplugged all external devices and disabled bluetooth.

- Cleared shader and DirectX cache.

- Disabled all overlays (NVIDIA, Discord, etc.).

- Disabled Microsoft Device Association Enumerator in Device Manager as other similar posts suggested.

- Reinstalled FFXIV completely from scratch.

- Made sure that firewall and antivirus are disabled / not interfering with the game.

- Changed local DNS to 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4.

- Cleared DNS Cache.

- Power cycled the router/modem by shutting down the router and leaving the power supply unplugged for 12 hours.

- Disabled all background applications and did a clean boot.

- Disabled Fullscreen Optimizations.

- Tested the game with all graphics settings lowered to minimum and still experienced stuttering during peak hours.

- Uncapped/capped fps to my monitor refresh rate (60fps).

- Disabled/enabled Vsync in NVIDIA Settings.

- Checked for background processes causing disk spikes.

- Ensured Game Mode is enabled.

- Disable Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling.

- Confirmed that power settings are set to High Performance in Windows and NVIDIA Control Panel

- Monitored FPS with NVIDIA overlay and confirmed that frame drops coincide with the stuttering moments (e.g., from ~60 FPS to ~30 FPS for 1–2 seconds).

- Opened all the recommended port ranges for FFXIV on my router:
▼TCP
54992 through 54994,
55006 through 55007,
55021 through 55040.


- Contacted my ISP (VTR), who confirmed that there are no connection issues on their side, and that my domestic network remains stable.


Thank you very much for your time and assistance. At this point I'm genuinely unsure what else i can do on my end, as I’ve exhausted all available troubleshooting options. The ongoing nature of this issue has been extremely discouraging, as it has made the game unplayable for me since August and I may ultimately be forced to stop playing a game I truly love if it remains unresolved.
Please let me know if you need additional logs, traceroutes, or system information.

Best regards


-=-=-=-=-=-=- FFXIV Information -=-=-=-=-=-=-

FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn Language 1 Region 3
ProxyEnable 0
ProxyServer unspecified
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-=-=-=-=-=-=- System Information -=-=-=-=-=-=-

SYSTEM_OS Windows 11 Home Single Language 64-bit (6.2, Build 9200) (26100.ge_release.240331-1435)
SYSTEM_CPU AMD Ryzen 7 4800H with Radeon Graphics (16 CPUs), ~2.9GHz
SYSTEM_CORE_NUM SYSTEM_CORE_LOGIC 16 SYSTEM_CORE_PHYSICS 8
SYSTEM_BIOS F.22
SYSTEM_LANGUAGE English (Regional Setting: English)
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SYSTEM_VIRTUAL_MEMORY 134217727.875MB
SYSTEM_PAGE_FILE 31462.477MB
SYSTEM_STORAGE C:\ SYSTEM_HARDDISK_DRIVE SYSTEM_TOTALDISC_SPACE 475.696GB SYSTEM_FREEDISC_SPACE 21.249GB
SYSTEM_DIRECTX_VERSION DirectX 12
GRAPHICS \\.\DISPLAY1 AMD Radeon(TM) Graphics
GRAPHICS_CHIP AMD Radeon Graphics Processor (0x1636)
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GRAPHICS_SHARED_VRAM 7865.619 MB
GRAPHICS_DISPLAY_MODE 1920 x 1080 (32 bit) (60Hz)
GRAPHICS_DRIVER C:\WINDOWS\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\u0417877.inf_amd64_8b2c2b61b3f8a9e5\B417004\aticfx64.dll,C:\WINDOWS\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\u0417877.inf_amd64_8b2c2b61b3f8a9e5\B417004\aticfx64.dll,C:\WINDOWS\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\u0417877.inf_amd64_8b2c2b61b3f8a9e5\B417004\aticfx64.dll,C:\WINDOWS\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\u0417877.inf_amd64_8b2c2b61b3f8a9e5\B417004\amdxc64.dll
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SOUND_DRIVER_VERSION 6.0.9159.1 4/26/2021 21:00:00
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Adobe Genuine Service
MSI Afterburner 4.6.5
AMD Chipset Software
Google Chrome
JDownloader 2
K-Lite Codec Pack 13.7.5 Basic
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Adobe Photoshop 2023
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Pulse Secure 9.0
Pulse Secure Setup Client Activex Control
RetroArch
RivaTuner Statistics Server 7.3.6
Steam
UXP WebView Support
HP Audio Switch
UE4 Prerequisites (x64)
FINAL FANTASY XIV ONLINE
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Java Auto Updater
Port Forward Network Utilities version 3.3.0.0
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Attribute Changer 11.30c
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NVIDIA Graphics Driver 581.29
NVIDIA App 11.0.5.420
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FxSound
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Intel(R) Computing Improvement Program
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BCUninstaller 5.9.0.0

You should try a clean boot via msconfig without any background programs - this can help to find the the app that interrupting in the background.

Update to latest NVIDIA driver again.

Disable any overlays (Discord, Rivatuner etc)

Uninstall all unneeded software (McAffee, VPN Software that is not needed)

You can also try "LatencyMon" running to check if there is a app causing a drop in latency.

If none of this help, consider reinstall windows completeley. You have some tools installed, that coudl cause unwanted changes (Registry Edit).