Nox Player is one of the most popular Android emulators on the market, known for its powerful features and fast speed. However, some gamers have reported Nox Player constantly crashes on PCs. If you happen to be one of them, no worries! We have a few working fixes you can try.
Try these fixes…
You don’t have to try them all, just work your way down the list until you find the one that does the trick!
3: Check your security software
5: Update your graphics driver
6: Increase virtual memory size on your PC
8: Update/reinstall Nox Player
Fix 1: Close background programs
Usually we’d turn off unnecessary programs when we play games on PC for smoother performance. Same for Nox Player, it’s the best to run this emulator without background programs eating all the resources or causing interference. You can close the background programs completely in the Task Manager:
- Press Ctrl and Shift and Esc to open the Task Manager.
- Under the Processes tab, select the process(es) that you want to shut down, and click End task.
If this doesn’t solve your problem, try the next fix.
Fix 2: Enable virtualization
Virtualization technology allows multiple operating systems to run on one physical PC. Since we’re trying to run an Android emulator on a Windows PC, it’s essential to enable virtualization which could improve the performance of Nox Player.
First you can check if virtualization is already enabled on your PC. If not, you’ll need to enable it in BIOS.
Check if virtualization is turned on
- Run Nox Player. On the top-right corner, click the three-line icon and select System info.
- Look for CPU VT. If it’s already on, you can jump to fix 3. If not, you’ll need to enter BIOS to enable it.
Enable virtualization in BIOS
- Click Start >> Power. Hold down the shift key and click Restart at the same time. This will completely shut down your PC before it reboots.
- When your PC restarts and shows the manufacturer logo, hold down the BIOS hotkey until you enter BIOS setup.
The hotkey is usually F1, F2, F12, Del or Esc depending on different models. If you’re not sure which one works on your PC, consult the manufacturer manual or search online. - Find the virtualization setting in BIOS. The layout can also differ on motherboards, so you may see different terms. Look for Virtual, Virtualization, VT-X, or SVM.
- Enable virtualization, then save and exit.
NOTE: Sometimes even if you have virtualization enabled, Nox Player would still crash. One extra step you can do is to turn off Hyper-V, which is a Windows feature that may cause interference when virtualization is enabled.
Disable Hyper-V
- Press the Windows logo key and R to invoke the Run box.
- Type appwiz.cpl, then click OK.
- On the left panel, click Turn Windows features on or off.
- Untick the boxes of Hyper-V related settings, then click OK.
If you’ve enabled virtualization but Nox Player still crashes, try the next fix.
Fix 3: Check your security software
If your firewall and antivirus software (if you use any) have blocked Nox Player, it won’t run properly on your PC. You can add Nox Player to the whitelist, and configure your antivirus to stop the interference.
Allow Nox Player through the firewall
Check if your firewall is blocking Nox Player
- Press the Windows logo key and R to invoke the Run box.
- Type control panel, then click OK.
- Switch to View by: small icons, then click Windows Defender Firewall.
- Click Allow an app or feature through Windows Defender Firewall.
- Scroll down to see if Nox Player is already on the exception list. If so, jump to antivirus configuration. If not, follow the steps below to unblock Nox Player.
Add Nox Player to the exception list
- Click Change settings, then click Allow another app.
- Click Browse.
- Navigate to where you installed Nox Player and add Nox.exe.
- Click Add.
- Tick the checkbox of Private network. This will ensure Nox Player is only unblocked when you’re using a private network, such as home Wi-Fi, out of safety concerns. Or you can allow Nox Player through all types of networks if needed.
- Click OK to save the changes.
You can test if the crashing issue returns. If it persists and you’re not using any antivirus tools, jump to fix 4. If you have installed antivirus on your PC, follow the steps below.
Configure your antivirus software
For antivirus, you also need to make sure it’s not blocking Nox. You can add Nox Player to the whitelist and then test the issue again.
In addition, many antivirus software requires hardware-assisted virtualization for additional protection. As we mentioned above, virtualization is also essential for Nox Player. When both programs run at the same time, they may conflict with each other. In this case, you’ll need to turn off hardware-assisted virtualization for your antivirus.
Below is a list of tutorials to configure settings for a few popular antivirus tools:
You can disable your antivirus temporarily if you want to test if the antivirus software itself is causing the interference,. Be extra cautious since browsing the web when your PC isn’t under protection can be risky.
If your antivirus program does seem to cause the problem, contact the supplier for further assistance.
Fix 4: Disable overlays
Many programs such as Twitch and Zoom have an overlay feature, which is quite handy. However, overlays could cause performance issues for other programs, including emulators and games. If your Nox Player keeps crashing while you have overlays turned on, make sure to disable them and test the issue.
If this doesn’t solve your problem, move on to the next fix.
Fix 5: Update your graphics driver
An outdated or faulty graphics driver can cause game performance issues and affect emulators. You may want to make sure yours is up-to-date and functioning properly.
There are two ways to keep your graphics card driver up-to-date. One is to manually update it via Device Manager. If Windows doesn’t have the latest version available, you can search on the manufacturer’s website. Be sure to choose only the driver that is compatible with your Windows version.
Automatic driver update – If you don’t have the time, patience, or computer skills to update your driver manually, you can, instead, do it automatically with Driver Easy. Driver Easy will automatically recognize your system and find the correct driver for your exact graphics card and your Windows version, then it will download and install it correctly:
- Download and install Driver Easy.
- Run Driver Easy and click the Scan Now button. Driver Easy will then scan your computer and detect any problem drivers.
- Click the Update button next to the flagged graphics driver to automatically download the correct version of the driver, then you can manually install it (you can do this with the FREE version).
Or click Update All to automatically download and install the correct version of all the drivers that are missing or out of date on your system. (This requires the Pro version which comes with full support and a 30-day money-back guarantee. You’ll be prompted to upgrade when you click Update All.)
If you need assistance, please contact Driver Easy’s support team at support@drivereasy.com.
Restart your PC for the new driver to take effect. If your graphics card driver is up-to-date but Nox still crashes, try the next fix.
Fix 6: Increase virtual memory size on your PC
Insufficient virtual memory (paging file) size can be a reason that Nox Player keeps crashing. Increasing virtual memory on your PC may help with the problem, so you can configure as needed. Here’s how:
Check the paging file size on your PC
- Press the Window key and R to invoke the Run box.
- Type in sysdm.cpl and click OK.
- Go to the Advanced tab. Under the Performance option, click Settings.
- Switch to the Advanced tab and click Change.
- You’ll see your virtual memory (paging file) size.
Increase virtual memory size
If you want to increase the virtual memory size to fix the Nox crashing issue, you can manually allocate the paging file size:
- Untick the checkbox of Automatically manage paging file size for all drives, then select Custom size. It’s suggested to set your paging file size between 1.5 times and 3 times your RAM.
- If you don’t know how much RAM you have, first, press the Windows key and R to invoke the Run box. Then, type in msinfo32 and hit OK.
- In the pop-up window, look for Installed Physical Memory (RAM).
- Once you know how much RAM you have, use the following formula to calculate the values you should fill in:
1GB = 1024 MB
Initial size (MB) = 1.5 * the amount of RAM (GB) on your PC
Maximum size (MB) = 3 * the amount of RAM (GB) on your PC - For example, I have 8 GB RAM, so I should set the initial size as 8*1024*1.5=12,288 MB, and my maximum size would be 8*1024*3=24576 MB. Click Set and OK to save the changes.
If you’ve customized the paging size to create more virtual memory, but the problem persists, try the next fix.
Fix 7: Change Nox Player settings
If you’ve tried the fixes above but nothing worked, consider adjusting the settings of Nox Player. You may have to sacrifice a little graphics quality, but it should help improve the stability of the emulator and hopefully stop it from crashing. Here’s how:
- Launch Nox Player. Click the gear icon on the top-right corner to open system settings.
- In the Performance settings, you can try switching between the graphics rendering modes to see which brings better performance. Also lower the resolution.
- Under Game settings, lower your FPS. You can tweak around to see what FPS value can best balance stability and performance, but we don’t recommend going below 40 as the graphics quality might suffer.
- Save the changes and restart Nox Player.
If this doesn’t fix your problem, we have one more fix you can try.
Fix 8: Update/reinstall Nox Player
One last thing you can try is to update the Nox Player or reinstall the whole program. Using the new versions can fix known bugs and will likely reduce crashes. By clicking the three-line icon on the top-right corner, you’ll be able to check for update.
To do a clean reinstall, make sure you delete the Nox Player as well as all the local files and cache before you reinstall the app.
Hopefully, this article helps! Please feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions or suggestions.
