NVIDIA Confirms Windows 11 KB5066835 Update Behind Lower Gaming Performance; Releases Hotfix Driver

In the past few days, if you figured out that some of your games suddenly feel sluggish, NVIDIA has an answer for it. The company says a recent Windows 11 Patch Tuesday update, KB5066835, released for version 24H2 and 25H2 on October 14, 2025, is behind performance dips reported across multiple titles.

NVIDIA has responded to the issue by rolling out a new hotfix driver, version 581.94. It builds on the earlier 581.80 release but includes a workaround for systems affected after installing KB5066835.

While the company didn’t specify the names of the affected games, user reports point to Black Ops 7 and Battlefield 6 showing the most obvious improvements after the driver update.

Folks over at Neowin came across a comment on NVIDIA’s forum where one user found performance to be a lot smoother in titles like Black Ops 7, Battlefield 6, and Arc Raiders post hotfix driver update.

Although the issue has been confirmed to have been triggered by the Windows 11 update, there’s no word on the matter from Microsoft. We’ll update this article if Microsoft adds something about it in the Windows Release Health Dashboard.

If you have been experiencing similar issues after installing the aforementioned update, don’t forget to install the hotfix driver update, which you can find here.