Blender GPU Not Detected / Not Showing in Preferences

How to fix it

Try these in order — the most common fix is first.

1. 1. Check your card is supported

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   1. NVIDIA: CUDA/OptiX need compute capability 5.0 or higher; OptiX needs a recent driver (575 or newer per current docs).
   2. AMD: HIP needs RDNA1 or newer (RX 5000 and up).
   3. Intel: oneAPI needs Arc A-Series or newer; Apple: Metal on Apple Silicon.
   4. If your card is brand new, try the latest Blender release or daily build.
   Did this fix it? Yes No

2. 2. Reinstall the driver

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   1. On NVIDIA run nvidia-smi in a terminal; if the card is not listed, the driver is the problem.
   2. Install the latest driver from the manufacturer website and restart.
   3. On Linux use your distribution package manager or the vendor installer.
   Did this fix it? Yes No

3. 3. Enable the device in both places

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   1. Open Edit > Preferences > System.
   2. Choose CUDA, OptiX, HIP, oneAPI or Metal under Cycles Render Devices and tick your GPU.
   3. In Render Properties set Render Engine to Cycles and Device to GPU Compute.
   Did this fix it? Yes No

4. 4. Force the dedicated GPU on laptops

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   1. Windows: Settings > System > Display > Graphics, add blender.exe and set High performance.
   2. Restart Blender and re-check the Preferences list.
   Did this fix it? Yes No

Symptoms

Preferences > System > Cycles Render Devices only shows None or CPU, or the Device dropdown in Render Properties is greyed out.

Why it happens

• Driver missing, outdated or broken (card not visible even to the OS tools)
• Wrong backend selected (CUDA, OptiX, HIP, oneAPI, Metal)
• GPU is too old or too new for your Blender version
• Laptop is running on the integrated GPU
• Scene Device still set to CPU

This guide also covers

• blender gpu not detected
• blender not using gpu
• blender cuda not showing
• blender optix not available

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