Options for launching Dota 2 on weak PC

Defense of the Ancients 2, or more commonly Dota 2, is a team-based multiplayer MOBA game created by Valve. The game is distributed through the digital platform Steam. 

But unfortunately not everyone can enjoy the game to the fullest. Without a strong PC or the right game launch parameters, the user simply can not play or even run the favorite game. How to properly configure the game so that anyone can comfortably play it. This is what we will talk about in this article. 

Why use launch parameters when there are settings in the game?

Most of the commands for the parameters, the player can find in the game settings. But it happens that the user can not launch the client of the game. How did players begin to encounter this problem?

Since the game release, Valve has many major updates that not only added new heroes and made balance changes, but also changed the game engine and made many changes to the game interface and its parameters.

On September 9, 2015, Dota 2 became the first game on the Source 2 engine. Despite the fresh interface, new features, and custom gameplay, many players around the world found themselves dissatisfied. 

The new engine required the player to have higher parameters of their devices, and alas not everyone was ready to afford to change the PC specifically for this update. At the same time the gaming community faced a lot of problems associated with running the game. Game forums, social networks and communities inside Steam were flooded with requests to help fix certain bugs. All these long loading game interface, the drop of FPS, the inability to launch the game just solved the correctly chosen launch parameters.

How and when to use options for launching Dota 2

When the player encounters launch problems or bugs within the client, it is worth resorting to a solution with launch parameters.

Launch options are commands that change the behavior of the game's client. With these settings, you can fix various bugs or incompatibilities of graphical parameters and the bitness of the Windows operating systems. Also, these commands help the player configure the client in a way that the game does not allow.

How to change the options for launching Dota 2

• Launch the Steam client.

• Authorize your account.

• Go to the "Library" section.

• Click on Dota 2 and select "Properties" from the drop menu.

• In the new window, stay in the "General" tab and go to the "Launch Options" property.

• Specify the required parameters in the line with spaces (for example: -parameter1 -parameter2 -parameter3)

Credit: Steam

Is it possible to play Dota 2 on a weak PC?

This question is addressed to almost every fan of the game, which turns out to be with an old PC or a weak laptop. At the moment, the game has quite low minimum requirements, so that "almost" every user can not only enter the main menu, and play it at an acceptable 40 FPS. But because of the overloaded interface, not everyone can even load the game to the main menu. But there is a solution that may well solve this problem.

The following startup parameters will help you with this:

What is it and why?

• -high – high CPU priority in Dota 2 to increase FPS in the game;

• -novid – disables the loading video;

• -prewarm - loads game resources in advance, reducing freezes on loading;

• +mat_queue_mode 2 - enables multi-threaded rendering, which can increase FPS.

Also note the list of the most useful commands that can be set in the launch parameters.

• -autoconfig — resets the performance settings and graphical parameters to the standard value that corresponds to this computer;

• -map dota — loads the map when you start the game. Helps reduce loading time after the game is found;

• -dx11, -vulkan – launches the game in the appropriate API: DX11 or Vulkan;

• -con_enable 1 – turns on the console in the game;

• -console – turns on the console and opens it when you start the game;

• -dev – enables developer mode. 

• -fullscreen – launches the game in full screen.

• -noborder – launches the game in a window without border.

• -windowed – launches the game in windowed mode.

• -prewarm – loads the necessary resources to start the game before the main screen.

Not so long ago, optimizing the game was helped by parameters that ran Dota 2 on DX9 or in OpenGL, as well as allowing you to enable the 32 bit version of the game. However, in 2025 these commands have lost their relevance, and their use has no effect on game performance.

What other settings are hiding in Dota 2?

Not all of the game settings were discussed above. In addition, the game client hides a lot of settings that can be set only inside the game through the console. Most of these settings already affect directly the gameplay and interface in the match. Some of them can even give you an advantage over other players.