How to Reduce Your GPU Temperature?

Graphic Processing Units are highly versatile modules that accelerate different computer programs and functions. Gamers, business owners, and professionals need a top-notch graphics card to deliver graphics-intensive and demanding jobs smoothly. We all know the original purpose of creating these modules was to hasten the 3D graphics rendering. But with time, their competence improved so tremendously that these cards are now the center of attention whenever the system is required to do something adventurous. Now video editors use this sharp device to create realistic scenes and natural visual effects in their videos and render them at a smooth pace.

Not only is this card admired for delivering better speed, but with time, developers have embellished it with new technologies, adding beautiful effects and contributing to the system in accomplishing heavy jobs. Let us make it straightforward for gamers: modern games are now equipped with advanced graphic abilities and do not show full visuals and sharp images if your graphics card does not match their requirements. You need a graphics card with at least similar potential as your game owns. Only then will you be thoroughly entertained with your gaming experience. Upgrading the graphics card is also a good idea for getting a mind-blowing gaming display.

Why Does Your GPU Temperature Rise?

Today’s discussion is on how we can reduce our GPU’s temperature scale. But first, let us make clear why GPU’s temperature is raised. Normal day activities we perform on our computer like reading files, internet surfing, and saving documents are not the reason for elevating GPU temperature as these are not aggressive tasks that burden your graphics card. Watching high-definition movies, listening to music, and playing games will not heat the graphics card. These chips get elevated temperatures only if you perform rigorous graphics activities and run applications that aggressively use your graphics card.

These GPU-intensive jobs include playing heavy games and using high-end software and tools in photo editing, graphics designing, video editing, rendering 3D videos, and some data research technologies. You can check by yourself whether your graphics card can support any of these features efficiently or not. You can use these tools and software on your system or set your game settings to higher resolution and notice the action capacity of the graphics card if it allows these tasks smoothly without generating noise or massive heat. In that case, it indicates your GPU is powerful enough, and its graphics capacity is brilliant to support these high-intensity jobs.

But if it generates sounds and elevates temperature, you must be careful while performing these tasks. Still, you will notice that as quickly the temperature surges, it becomes usual with the standard speed. So why are we worried about it so much? Is it a matter of concern? Not really; you have to be concerned only when your graphics card is performing sustained and heavy daily workloads. A working schedule of a few hours is not a hectic task for a GPU, but if it is maintained for extended periods, a GPU comes under stress, resulting in temperature enhancement.

For example, suppose you are a content creator on Youtube and generate videos daily. You keep the system busy rendering your videos all day to save time, and this is your daily routine you have to follow for months. It will raise GPU heat to a level that might produce thermal throttling. Another more intensive task is crypto mining, where your system must always mine. With these tasks, the chances of your system thermal throttling are higher. It will directly impact a GPUs clock speed, and there is a high possibility that your system can crash.

How Can We Determine if a Temperature Spike Faced by GPU is Dangerous?

Is the temperature spike your GPU faces normal or dangerous for any part of your system? And what is the range of safe temperature limits? So many questions spring into our minds, and their answers vary. Yes, we can not justify the safe temperature limits of a graphics card as their potential manufacturers develop these units with different specifications, which can uphold varying levels of workloads and, ultimately, the enormous heat they produce. Some GPUs are seen supporting intensive tasks without getting messed up, while others start throttling. So how can we check whether our GPU is capable of handling varying levels of workload or not?

Fortunately, you do not have to dig deeper if you use new windows like Windows 10, as these are equipped with tools to check your GPU performance and utilization and also help monitor its temperature. You have to click the Task Manager, and then in the Performance Tab, you can find your required tool. It shows your temperature reading on the Celsius scale whenever you want to check. Trying third-party software like MSI Afterburner is also a reasonable suggestion for other users. This software is reliable for reviewing and monitoring a GPU’s performance and temperature balance. You can even modify its core and memory clock speed using this tool.

Now, let us lighten the safe temperature limits a GPU can hold. For some GPUs, this value is 82 degrees Celsius. Others can bear up to 90 degrees Celsius. If the heat exceeds 95 degrees, it can be dangerous for your system, forcing it to throttle. Sometimes throttling is not intensive, but the system becomes so hot that it can still result in experiencing a crash. So the best advice from our side is to manage a GPUs workload and keep its temperature below 90 degrees Celsius. This value keeps your GPU in the ideal temperature zone without affecting your activities.

Let’s Discuss Ways to Lower Down GPU Temperature:

We focused our discussion till now on delivering you enough information to build an understanding of GPU temperature variations and how we can monitor them. Now we are heading towards some solutions to lower the temperature of a GPU. This guide tends to discuss almost all the possible ways you can use to cool down your graphics unit. So please stick with us till the last tip we have shared here.

1: Try Compressed Air to Clean the Dust on Your Hardware: 

We all may have noticed that the modules which perform challenging tasks generate heat and warm the system. This heat could depend more or less on the type of duty a device handles. But the question arises of how to get rid of this heat and its harmful impacts. Excessive heat-generating computer units are provided with fans that expel the heat. If you do not keep the hardware clean, dust may compile on the surface and inside the case. This dust blocks the passageways and hinders airflow creating difficulties for heat to move out.

If you successfully make the system dust-free, you can prevent your GPU from getting extra temperature degrees. But you have to be careful; using some strange ways might harm the small and sensitive components. You can use compressed air, alcohol wipes, and a screwdriver to blow the dust away. First, rub the outer surface of a graphics card with a wipe and clean it. Then use the screwdriver to open it. Now carefully separate the cooler and fan without damaging the nearby wires. The dust which enters the card is stuck in many areas, especially the cooler and fan.

Bring both to an open place and blow dust away using a compressed air bag. A fan is made of sharp blades, which can also have tiny heaps of dirt. Clean all the edges with the wipe. Take the help of an alcohol wipe to clean the graphics card’s surface gently, as its tiny components might have grabbed some dust. After cleaning all the stuff, let it dry and then compile them back together. Things must be held tightly with the same strength as the original and in the same place, so take the help of a screwdriver to assemble all the parts.

Once assembled, put the GPU back on your personal computer. We recommend you clean the GPU and its internal components like fans and heatsinks in an isolated and open place; otherwise, the dust might fly, contaminate the air, and enter other parts of your PC. A PC free from dust particles helps improve the airflow, giving outside vent to the hot air produced and letting the cool air roam inside.

2: Time to Replace the Thermal Paste:

The thermal paste helps heat find an easy way out of your hardware. If this paste dries out, the ability of your device to dispose of hot air is immensely diminished. It leads to bubble formation, which blocks the passage heat uses to move out. Moreover, this paste also tends to burn away with time if your device constantly works at high temperatures day and night. In that situation, you are left with only one way: to try out a new protection layer. This simple and quick solution involves replacing old and worn-out thermal paste and applying a new layer.

There are two options for you, either try a paste that can be purchased at an affordable price or get the best thermal paste available on the market. Your preference should be to choose the one that best performs the task of disposing of the heat. But wait, this process is not as easy as you might consider. If you have not applied a thermal layer on your graphics card earlier, we would not advise you to try it out yourself. Instead, visit a nearby hardware store and take help from a technician or experienced fellow in this field. An efficiently applied thermal paste will direct the heat straight to a heat sink and keep the flow of cool air stable and consistent in the case.

3: Try Ways to Improve Airflow:

Any restriction in the path of hot air moving out and cool air coming in can impair the ability of a GPU to work well. A GPU tries to remain calm, but too much hot air accumulates, urging the need for fans. Therefore, adding more fans to the GPU helps improve air ventilation. If you want to place more fans, keep them in a suitable configuration to establish a proper airflow path. Group the heat emitting fans in a group, and the fans bring cool air to another group. They will work jointly and forcefully move air in the desired direction.

4: Keep GPU Drivers Updated:

Keep your GPU updated every time. It is one of the easiest and most sharp methods to keep your graphics processing unit cool and efficient to perform. Developers keep working to advance a graphics card’s algorithms and other features. They fine-tuned the GPU processes, and these advancements decide how a GPU can behave in a system. The progress manufacturers are looking to gain in a GPU holds significant importance. It enables your computer to work more skillfully by consuming less power than it typically demands. What does that mean when we say a module is more efficient now? That means it would not give rise to heat and its associated after-effects.

5: Invest some Capital in Cooling Mechanism:

Adding more fans and heat sinks to your device is a good option, but your device might not always need them. Cases are limited in space, and you can not have a good number of fans in them for efficient heat management. Sometimes you have to go for an alternative, wonderfully performing solution. If you want to extend the performance as well as the lifespan of your device, spending some money is not a bad idea. Replace extra fans and heat sinks and arrange a cooling water system for your device. Make sure your product comes from a trusted and certified seller. First, this system is quite expensive, and there is no space to invest in the wrong product. Second, poor efficiency of the water-cooling mechanism can result in any mishap.

6: Switch In-game Optimization to Lower Resolution and Graphics:

Our games have built-in settings where you can go and check all the specifications of a game. These settings show three modes, low, medium, and high. Gaming enthusiasts are so keen on gaming details that they do not consider anything less. But a game set to a higher resolution makes you pay for your system performance slowly over a prolonged time. A GPU feels exhausted by continuously delivering you high pixels. Please give it a bit of relief and set your gaming resolution to medium or lower pixels. That way, a GPU needs to tackle fewer images in a frame and sustain its performance for longer time intervals.

You can spend wisely and set your gaming image transfer rate to 60 frames per second, which is neither too low for smooth gameplay nor too high to stress your GPU out. A massive frame rate will only exhaust your graphics card and may lead to hot air enough to cause thermal throttling. Even when your graphics card is new, keep the frame rate at 60; this cap will help you maximum utilize a GPU and minimize the chances of getting hot.

7: Revert to Pre-Clocked Parameters:

Overclocking refers to extending the performance of a device beyond what it can support at standard capacity. When we overclock any operating machine, we ask it to fulfill the needs of our high-performance demanding software. As a result, the system workload increases, and its memory and core clock speed are also enhanced. Now the scale at which your computer operates is far more than what manufacturers have certified for this product. Hence, the system consumes more voltage to meet the big needs of running intensive programs. As a result, enormous heat is produced, which assembles to raise a GPU’s temperature.

Therefore, we recommend you revert to the optimal settings before clocking the GPU. This way, your GPU will use a regular voltage supply, work stably without feeling burdened, and can be an essential part of your hardware for extended periods. But if you overclock the GPU, it shows above-average performance without running hotter and keeping along with those settings. It is not the warning sign of a system close to crashing. Do not pay a deaf ear to your GPU performance, as even if it supports overclocking, it still runs at temperatures higher than usual.

If this continues, disastrous impacts can ruin your GPU in the long run. Here we hope you are very cautious about your GPU health and will run it at optimal clock speed because no one can deny the adverse effect of overclocking on a GPU capacity in the long run. Where many other factors can be considered key players in sparking a GPU temperature and deteriorating its performance, overclocking is likely the most probable culprit for causing potential harm. Whereas reverting to pre-clocked settings can still prove to be a GPU savior in this situation.