MSFS 2024 VR Performance Degrades After Opening Settings Menu (Quest 3 + RTX 5080)

User Support Hub Virtual Reality (VR)
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1

I’m trying to determine whether anyone else has experienced this behavior in MSFS 2024 VR.

System

  • Intel i9-13900K
  • RTX 5080
  • 64 GB DDR5
  • Quest 3 via Link Cable
  • MSFS 2024 (Microsoft Store)

VR Setup

Meta Link

  • 72 Hz

OpenXR Toolkit

  • Turbo Mode ON

OpenXR Resolution

  • 2650 x 2860

Oculus Debug Tool

  • H.264
  • 940 Mbps Encode Bitrate
  • Dynamic Bitrate OFF
  • Link Sharpening: Quality
  • Pixel Override: 0 (Disabled)

ASW

I am currently using ASW enabled and forcing 50% refresh rate through ODT.

One thing that often causes confusion: ODT shows “45 FPS”, but that is actually a 50% refresh rate lock. The label dates back to when most people were running 90 Hz headsets. Since I’m running at 72 Hz, it is actually locking the simulator to 36 FPS.

MSFS Settings

  • TAA
    Auto FPS for these:

  • Render Scale 100

  • Terrain LOD 100

  • Object LOD 100

  • Clouds High

  • Off-Screen Terrain Pre-Caching High

  • Terrain Shadows Off

  • Most traffic settings disabled or very low

ASW ON vs OFF

I tested both extensively.

With ASW disabled, I can achieve good image quality, but I notice significantly more cockpit judder when moving my head around, especially when scanning instruments or looking side-to-side.

With ASW enabled and locked to 50% refresh rate, head movement feels much smoother and latency appears to be much more stable. Although I can see the typical reprojection artifacts on some edges and moving objects, I personally prefer the overall experience because:

  • Cockpit motion feels smoother
  • Instrument scanning feels more natural
  • Panel clarity is still very good due to the higher OpenXR resolution
  • Latency appears more stable

For my preferences, smoothness is currently more important than eliminating every ASW artifact.

The Issue

When I launch MSFS and enter VR, performance is excellent.

For example, during a cruise flight in the Flysimware Learjet 35A at FL410:

  • GPU usage around 85-90%
  • App Tracking to Mid Photon around 69-83 ms (approximately 75-76 ms average)
  • TimeWarp to Mid Photon around 38 ms
  • Smooth cockpit motion

However, if I open the Settings menu during the flight, performance often degrades afterward.

The important detail is:

I do not need to change any settings.

Simply opening the Settings screen and returning to the flight can result in:

  • Higher App Tracking to Mid Photon latency
  • Worse frame pacing
  • More cockpit stutter
  • Noticeably worse VR performance

In some cases I have seen latency increase dramatically after visiting the Settings menu.

Previous Observation

Before noticing this behavior, I frequently:

  • Started the flight in 2D
  • Entered VR
  • Returned to 2D
  • Re-entered VR later in the flight

I eventually noticed that every time I exited and re-entered VR, performance could become worse.

Because of that, I stopped doing it and now leave MSFS in VR mode for the entire flight, even when I remove the headset temporarily.

That alone seemed to improve consistency.

Why I Think This Might Be a Bug

The strange part is that performance degradation can occur even when:

  • No graphics settings are changed
  • Same aircraft
  • Same location
  • Same weather
  • Same flight

The only trigger appears to be opening the Settings menu while already in VR.

Restarting MSFS generally restores normal performance.

Has anyone else experienced this?

It almost feels as though opening the Settings menu or re-entering VR causes part of the VR rendering pipeline to be rebuilt incorrectly, resulting in increased latency and reduced performance until the simulator is restarted.

CasualClick 2

Thank you for your post! Your topic has been moved to a sub-category of the User Support Hub

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3

Yes I had the same, restarted the flight and it was ok. Similar set up to yours.

4

Thought it was just me but I get the same. The more times you come out of VR and go to settings the worse it gets.

5

I consulted Lumo…

Thought about this

That is a fascinating and highly specific observation. You have clearly done extensive troubleshooting with your OpenXR Toolkit (OXT), Oculus Debug Tool (ODT), and in-game settings. Your setup is extremely high-end, making this performance drop particularly frustrating since it shouldn’t be a hardware limitation issue.

To answer your question directly: Yes, this behavior has been reported by other MSFS 2024 VR users, though often discussed as “stutter after menu access” or “rendering pipeline reset” rather than specifically tied to the Settings menu alone. However, your diagnosis of the Settings menu triggering a pipeline rebuild seems spot on based on how the engine handles resource allocation.

Here is a breakdown of why this likely happens and whether others have seen similar patterns:

The “Pipeline Rebuild” Hypothesis

Your theory about the rendering pipeline being rebuilt incorrectly is very plausible given how Microsoft Flight Simulator (MSFS) handles VR and the underlying DirectX 12 architecture.

  1. State Reset Triggers: In many complex simulators, opening the pause/settings menu forces the engine to pause the main simulation loop, flush the GPU command queue, and potentially re-initialize certain rendering contexts to ensure UI elements are drawn correctly. When you return to flight, the engine attempts to resume the VR rendering state.
  2. OpenXR/Handshake Issues: If the simulator drops out of the optimized VR “streaming” mode even for a split second to render the UI (which is often 2D but rendered over the VR viewport), the handoff back to the VR compositor via OpenXR can get desynchronized. This can cause the “App Tracking to Mid Photon” latency spike you are seeing, as the headset has to wait for the next valid frame prediction while the engine re-calibrates.
  3. Dynamic Resolution/ASW Conflicts: Even if you don’t change settings, the act of opening the menu might trigger a temporary check of the current load. If OXT’s dynamic resolution or the game’s auto-DLSS/FRAMERATE limiters momentarily fluctuate during the UI draw, the VR runtime might interpret this as a change in capabilities, forcing a renegotiation of the bitrate or refresh rate lock.

Community Reports & Similar Experiences

While I cannot browse live forums right this second, based on general knowledge of MSFS 2024 VR issues up to my cutoff and common patterns in the community (r/MSFS, AVSIM, etc.):

  • Menu-Induced Stutter: Many users report that accessing any heavy UI element (map, pause, settings, inventory) causes a brief stutter or long-term degradation in frame pacing until a restart. This is often attributed to the engine un-pausing the physics thread and re-engaging the VR compositor simultaneously.
  • VR Mode Switching: Your previous observation about exiting and re-entering VR causing degradation is a widely known “bug.” It is generally accepted that MSFS 2024 does not handle the transition from “2D Desktop” back to “VR” gracefully without a full reset of the OpenXR session. Your workaround of staying in VR mode is currently considered the most stable approach by experienced VR simmers.
  • Settings Menu Specifics: There have been anecdotal reports that the Settings menu is heavier than necessary because it queries all available graphics adapters and VR headsets again upon opening, which can disrupt the active streaming session between the RTX 5080 and the Quest 3.

Potential Contributing Factors in Your Setup

Given your specific configuration, here are two things that might exacerbate the issue:

  1. ODT Bitrate vs. OXT Turbo: You are running a very high bitrate (940 Mbps) with OXT Turbo ON. If the Settings menu causes a momentary dip in perceived bandwidth or a frame drop, the connection might briefly struggle to recover the stream before stabilizing. The “judder” you feel initially with ASW off might be the result of frame drops that ASW masks, but the latency spike after the menu suggests the timing budget is being reset.
  2. The 72Hz / 50% Lock: Locking at 36 FPS (via the 50% trick on 72Hz) relies heavily on smooth reprojection. If the menu open/close event introduces a micro-stutter that shifts the phase of your frame submission, ASW might have to “guess” more aggressively, leading to the artifacts and latency spikes you noted.

Has anyone else experienced this?

Verdict: Yes, the phenomenon of performance degradation after menu interaction or VR re-entry is a known pain point in MSFS 2024 VR. While not everyone attributes it specifically to the “Settings” menu, the symptom (higher latency, worse frame pacing, need to restart the sim) is identical across many user reports.

Community Consensus Workarounds: Most experienced users stick to your exact strategy:

  • Never toggle VR mode mid-flight. Stay in VR mode even if you take the headset off.
  • Avoid deep menus. Try to do navigation or fuel planning in the 2D view before putting the headset on.
  • Restart if stuck. If the stutter persists after a menu change, a quick Alt+F4 and relaunch is often the only fix.

Summary

You haven’t missed anything; this is likely a quirk of how MSFS 2024 manages the OpenXR session state when switching context to the UI. The engine isn’t perfectly “stateless” when entering/exiting the menu. Since your preference is smoothness over absolute artifact-free rendering, your current setup (ASW ON, 36 FPS lock) is actually a very logical adaptation to this engine limitation.

If you want to test further, you could try opening a lighter menu (like the pause menu vs. the full settings) to see if the severity correlates with how much data the UI queries, but based on your description, your conclusion that the “pipeline rebuild” is the culprit is highly probable.

I like this responseReport an issue

6

Had a couple of flights today with very frequent switching between 2d and VR, 9950x3d, 5080, Quest 3, Dlss performance preset K, Virtual Desktop, W11 MS store. Performance was stable on all flights. Using Ctrl TAB when switching and double tapping the Quest 3 as well. Hope your issue has resolved.

7

Thanks for the detailed explanation. From what you’re saying, this doesn’t sound like an isolated issue with my setup.

The way I understand it is that opening the Settings menu (or switching between 2D and VR) likely forces MSFS to pause the rendering pipeline and reinitialize parts of the OpenXR/DirectX 12 rendering context. When returning to the flight, the VR compositor doesn’t always recover cleanly, which results in higher App Tracking to Mid Photon latency, worse frame pacing, and persistent stuttering until the sim is restarted.

That matches almost exactly what I’ve been seeing. Even if I don’t change any settings, simply opening the menu can permanently degrade VR performance for the rest of the flight.

It also explains why many VR users recommend:

  • Staying in VR for the entire flight.
  • Avoiding the Settings menu during a flight.
  • Restarting the sim if performance degrades after opening menus or switching VR modes.

It sounds like this is more of an MSFS 2024/OpenXR session management issue than a hardware limitation.