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Do games need an SSD? Stutter and loading on a hard drive

By Michael Steininger · Updated October 2026

On a hard drive, games load slowly. Worse, many current games load parts of the world while you play, and a hard drive can't keep up: textures appear late and the game hitches when you move fast. Many new games list an SSD as a requirement.

Quick answerInstall your games on an SSD. Check where a game is installed in its launcher, and move it with the launcher's own move function. Even a cheap SATA SSD solves the stutter; an NVMe SSD loads faster still.

Why a hard drive causes stutter#

Open-world and newer games stream textures, models and sounds from the disk as you move. A hard drive needs several milliseconds to reach each piece of data; an SSD needs a fraction of a millisecond. When many small files are needed at once, the hard drive falls behind, and the game either waits (a hitch) or shows a blurry placeholder.

Check where a game is installed#

  • Windows: Task Manager → Performance shows each drive with its type (SSD or HDD).
  • Steam: Settings → Storage lists the drives and the games on each.
  • Epic, EA, Ubisoft, Battle.net: each game's settings show its install folder.

Move a game to the SSD#

Use the launcher's move function instead of copying folders by hand. In Steam: Settings → Storage → select the game → Move. Other launchers have similar options, or let you point a new install at the old folder so it only verifies the files.

SATA or NVMe?#

For stutter, any SSD fixes it. NVMe SSDs load faster than SATA SSDs, and games using DirectStorage benefit more from them, but the jump from hard drive to any SSD is by far the biggest.

Questions#

Does an SSD increase FPS?
Not the average FPS, but it removes stutter caused by loading while you play, and loading screens get much shorter.
Can I keep older games on a hard drive?
Yes. Older and smaller games, and games with loading screens between levels, run fine from a hard drive. Keep the open-world and newest games on the SSD.
Check it automatically

Frametide's scan checks your PC for setup problems like this one and tells you how many it found (Basic, €12.99 once). Premium (€26.99 once) shows which ones and how to fix them. Its checks include games installed on a hard drive and drives running out of space.

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