Path of Exile 2 never ending loading screens

Hello,

I got sent here from GGG support to post my problem there, so I won`t be describing it once again and just paste here my email about my problem that i have written to them.


Hello dear GGG Support,

We all know that the 0.4 version of the game is being close to live, and with that I wanted to check how is my Path of Exile 2 game working (had frames problems because of low specs and recently I upgraded my CPU in hopes of the game working a tad bit better than 2 fps on maps) so I will be ready when the time of the league start comes. To my surprise, game was stuck on loading screen for straight 20 minutes (with my hand on the clock) and only then finally loading into the interlude city. Then loading to my hideout took another 15 minutes. I thought it was because my game was located on a HDD drive, so I moved it to my SSD drive. Then after waiting for my game to load for 20 minutes again, twice, when I opened the game once more it miraculously loaded in just one minute. And then I tried loading into a map. It took 40 minutes being stuck on a loading screen for me to give up and force close the game. I tried reinstalling. After that my game wont even load into my hideout. Waiting for probably over 30 minutes just for it to kick me back into the main menu. I can`t change the rederer bc the game stops responding (Vulkan -> Directx12), I tried reinstalling (earlier), disabling steam overlay, disabling multithreading (read on the internet that it might break some things), verificating files if something was missing (everything was fine). I don`t know what to do, I feel like I tried everything. If You need any more information about my specs or anything tell me and I will provide You with it. I just wanna play some PoE2 at the start of the league. Also I cant get me code for the ticket for obvious reasons but I hope that Yall can help me soon, before the 12th.


Thanks to any of You that might spend their time reading this and helping me with this problem. Any kind of help is appreciated (just keep in mind what have I already done.)
:)
Last bumped on Dec 14, 2025, 12:04:35 PM
I have been having the same issue and the internet has been less than helpful. I've already tried everything the internet suggested but most posts I have found about this issue are from around a year ago. I am really excited for the next patch and I am honestly worried that I won't be able to play it.
I'm in the same boat.

Game was working flawlessly before.

I have a 9800X3D and a 9070XT.

Deleted all caches.

Game takes at least 10 full minutes of loading time for a new character. I can't comprehend this. Used to take 5 seconds.
Same here. Was working great for 0.3.

Ryzen 7 5700x
7800XT

Ran the game because of 0.4 hype -- stuck on the loading screen. My wife who is on Ryen 5 and 4060 is able to run it fine. I just... don't get it :(

Tried the solutions from the internet and nothing works.
Issue is same. Vulkan loads... Well basically without end.
And direct Vulkan -> DX12 swap indeed pretty much hangs game.

But you can still swap to DX12 if you swap to DX11 first, and then do swap to DX12.
[In other words do Vulkan -> DX11 (restart game) -> DX12]

That does not mean that this issue should not be fixed though. It is actually problematic.
My suspicions is that something is going on with Vulkan shader compilation.

5800X3D / 9070XT / W11 25H2 / Adrenalin 25.11.1 driver.


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UPD: Oh, yeah, based on comment below and quick test, seems like PoE1 is also affected.
And i found a thread on PoE1 bug report section:
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3882803/page/1#p26467262

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Last edited by DimkaTsv#7560 on Dec 7, 2025, 10:50:54 PM
"
But you can still swap to DX12 if you swap to DX11 first, and then do swap to DX12.
[In other words do Vulkan -> DX11 (restart game) -> DX12]


This worked!!!

My problem is that on AMD Hardware, DX12 is twice as worse as Vulkan. Its 3ms per frame on Vulkan, to 6ms per frame on DX12. 4ms per frame on DX12 FSR Quality, which looks so MUCH worse than native.

Hope they fix this in time for the release.

When I deleted all shader files and actually waited the 10 minutes to load the beach, all spells had no effects, final boss was invisible, my skeletons were invisible, my spell particles were invisible.

So yeah, I would reckon it is a Vulkan Shader problem, and a pretty severe at that.
I'm experiencing the same on AMD - several minutes (20+ minutes) loading time per area...
Last edited by SideKickerin#3133 on Dec 7, 2025, 3:14:39 AM
WTF whith this shader loading !! i got this problem on the new ligue in POE1.

I tried to relaunch POE2, and same problem !! infinite loading screen ....

[Removed by Support]

No, you are not stuck with it.
You can still switch to DX12

"
DimkaTsv#7560 wrote:
But you can still swap to DX12 if you swap to DX11 first, and then do swap to DX12.
[In other words do Vulkan -> DX11 (restart game) -> DX12]


But people don't really read into thread, are they? Even if it is relatively short one.

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UPD: 0.3.1f - issue still persist.
I know it wasn't mentioned in patchnotes anyways, but still worth to note.
It would be quite bad to start league with this issue, as a lot of people won't really check bug reports on forum.
Last edited by DimkaTsv#7560 on Dec 9, 2025, 4:24:52 PM
I installed 25H2 on 12-7-25 and POE2 stays on gears grinding....

I've uninstalled POE2 3x times past 4 days
I've used AMD cleanuputility 3 times past 4 days
I've used DISM command tool everyday past 4 days
Set GPU to stock settings NO change
Set CPU to stock settings NO change

Been playing just fine besides obvious FPS drops from 330-14 while in a party...

9800X3D
MSI Carbon Wifi X870E
Gskill TridentZ 6000Mt on EXPO 30CL 1.35V
Red Devil 7900XTX 25.11.1 now 25.12.1 driver
MSI MEG Ai1300P PSU
11x Noctua Industrial fans
Liquid Freezer III 420 black

So its obviously NOT my brand new hardware......
POE1 works(dont want to play it anymore)

Performance metrics F1 in game shows NVME activity when it initially starts before clicking play then on character select and load Hard drive activity stays at 0?

So something stopping HDD/ NVME from reading game Files

Someone know where to look to solve this?
beta key plz

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