Star Citizen Alpha requires DirectX 11.1 or higher.
To review the minimum system requirements to run Star Citizen, check out our Knowledge Base article: Star Citizen Minimum System Requirements
What does this mean for Star Citizen players?
DirectX version 11.1 is not compatible with the Windows 7 Operating System (OS), which we know some players still use for one reason or another. Microsoft officially ended support for the Windows 7 OS on January 14th, 2020. For more information on what this means, please read the related article on Microsoft's website by clicking here.
While the game may have run in a Windows 7 operating environment in the past, the update to utilize Direct X 11.1 will render the game unable to run on systems that are still using this OS due to the new requirement. The same will be true for players on systems using older graphics cards that cannot support DirectX 11.1 or higher. This will result in an error message on such systems that will stop the game from launching.
As this is an OS or hardware conflict, our Technical Support Agents will not be able to assist players having difficulties with running the game until they upgrade to a current, supported version of Windows with a supported graphics card.
While upgrading a graphics card is no small ask these days, OS upgrades can be purchased from Microsoft directly or from other computer software retailers that service your area. As with all software purchases, make certain that your computer can run it before buying.
If you have questions about upgrading your OS, please contact Microsoft Support for assistance.
What about Windows 11?
Star Citizen will fully support Windows 11, which was released in October 2021, however extensive testing and troubleshooting to ensure the game has proper compatibility in this operating environment is ongoing.
All technical issues found related to running the game on a Windows 11 operating system should be reported on the Issue Council so our teams can investigate and work through them while compatibility testing continues.
DirectX 11.1 Support
DirectX is related to graphics, and so this requires video cards that can support it. Most modern video cards released in the last few years can utilize this feature set. If you are unsure if your specific computer setup can support this, check with your video card manufacturer for the specifications. Some links to help kick of your search are below:
- Intel Graphics Cards - Specifications Search
- Nvidia Graphics Cards - Specs Comparison
- AMD and DirectX 12
The specifications that you are looking for are DirectX 3D 11.1 with the use of feature set 11_1.
Reshade and Star Citizen
At this time, the 3rd-party tools program Reshade is sometimes causing problems for players. When using this program, at times the game may incorrectly register that your video card and system is not compatible, thus preventing a player from even entering the game.
If you are currently using this program to improve the visual aspects of the 'verse, we recommend disabling or uninstalling it until the conflict is resolved should you encounter this erroneous error. We have had reports that renaming Reshade's d3d11.dll file to dxgi.dll before copying it to the "...StarCitizen/Live/Bin64" folder can work to correct this. However should that fail we still recommend disabling or uninstalling the program.
If error messages continue once this program is disabled and your system meets all specifications, please report things on the Issue Council for investigation.