UE5.8 VR Preview Crash with Deferred Rendering (Regression from 5.7)

General Issues and Bug Reporting (Unreal Engine)
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Summary

UE5.8 VR Preview Crash with Deferred Rendering (Regression from 5.7)

What Type of Bug are you experiencing?

Rendering (Graphics / Niagara)

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Open a VR project (new VR Template or existing project) in UE 5.8.
  2. Go to Project Settings → Engine → Rendering.
  3. Disable “Forward Shading” (use Deferred Rendering).
  4. Ensure “Instanced Stereo Rendering” is enabled.
  5. Click “VR Preview” button.

Expected Result

VR Preview should launch successfully with Deferred Rendering, as it did in UE 5.7.

Observed Result

Immediate crash with the following error:

Unhandled Exception: EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION reading address 0x0000000000000090

Callstack:
UnrealEditor_Renderer x7
UnrealEditor_RenderCore x4
UnrealEditor_Core x4
kernel32
ntdll

Affects Versions

5.8

Platform(s)

OpenXR

Additional Notes

This is a regression: works fine in 5.7, crashes in 5.8.

Temporary workaround: Enable Forward Shading (which is also recommended for VR performance).

Additional info:

  • VR SDK: OpenXR
  • GPU: RTX 4070