UE5 Crashing on startup due to an unhandled exception: EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION reading address 0x00007ff840001ac0

General Issues and Bug Reporting
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1

I just downloaded UE5, when I ran it, It immediately crashed

Unhandled Exception: EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION reading address 0x00007ff840001ac0

D3D12Core
D3D12Core
D3D12Core
D3D12Core
UnrealEditor_D3D12RHI
UnrealEditor_D3D12RHI
UnrealEditor_D3D12RHI
UnrealEditor_D3D12RHI
UnrealEditor_D3D12RHI
UnrealEditor_D3D12RHI
UnrealEditor_D3D12RHI
UnrealEditor_D3D12RHI
UnrealEditor_RHI
UnrealEditor
UnrealEditor
UnrealEditor
UnrealEditor
UnrealEditor
UnrealEditor
kernel32
ntdll

I don’t understand what is wrong. Do I reinstall? Do I go down a version? Is my pc just not capable?

2

someone else had RHI related crashes, you can try the fix he used:

Open your UE5 project folder.
Edit the file located at “path_to_your_UE5_project/config/DefaultEngine.ini”.
Find the line that says “DefaultGraphicsRHI=DefaultGraphicsRHI_DX12”.
Change it to “DefaultGraphicsRHI=DefaultGraphicsRHI_DX11”

if you dont have a project to test this fix on, and the crash happens when opening UE5.exe: open Epic Launcher, then just download some random free project template from Epic market so you can try the fix on DefaultEngine.ini. Then you will atleast know if this is the issue.

another solution: