Advancements in software do not always travel forward in a linear fashion. Sometimes they take two steps forward and a step back as new features come in adding much needed functionality but occasionally breaking something else. That’s very true right now with Microsoft Flight Simulator as it has become clear that Update 3 has caused some serious performance issues for some virtual pilots. Here’s what we know.

Many pilots are experiencing performance problems

After months of flying with Microsoft Flight Simulator doing flights in different aircraft and across all kinds of different places on the planet with good experiences and high frame rates the entire time, I am finally seeing some serious performance issues with Microsoft Flight Simulator. Worse than anything that I’ve seen previously with the sim. And if you’re in the same boat as I am, you’re not alone at all as a large number of users have reported issues.

In a thread on the Bugs section of the official forum, a post titled ‘Performance Degradation with 1.14.5.0. Upgrade‘ has received a few dozen replies and 1,032 upvotes. Multiple users have reported severe performance issues, often with their CPU pegged at 100% and frame rates fluctuating wildly. Others appear to be unaffected by the issue.

Asobo Studios for their part have acknowledged the issue with a brief statement.

The team is aware that performances can be impacted for some users.
We are investigating, thank you for your reports.

OlieTsubasa443, MSFS forum Community Manager

That was 13 days ago. A more recent interaction between a forum user and Jorg Neumann from the MSFS team has indicated more clearly that they intend to provide an status check during the Thursday update and that the team is working to identify the issue.

A brief hold on Flight Simulator content

Unfortunately, because performance is so degraded for me right now, I’m putting some of the content I had planned to write about on hold. I have no doubt that a future update will solve this problem and that I’ll be back to flying and enjoying the many good things about Microsoft Flight Simulator. However, for the moment my frame rate (sometimes in the single digits) is impeding my ability to write a complete review of the T-45C Goshawk or do some flight journal content about the UK Update. In the case of a review, it wouldn’t be at all fair of me to report on performance issues with that module if its not IndiaFoxTecho’s fault for example (although they have gone the extra mile to add a Lite version of the T-45 for users). I haven’t even started to look into the recent release of the CRJ from Aerosoft either.

I also want to say that I think it’s important to avoid over-exaggeration of the issue. Yeah these performance issues are a problem, a show stopping problem for some, and that means that the sim may not be playable right now. It’s disappointing but in the grand scheme of things its not fatal. The problems will be found, the update will come out, and if Asobo Studios is smart (and I think they are) they will take lessons learned here and incorporate it into future updates. We’ve had issues like this with other simulations before too so this is not a unique experience for a growing sim either.

In the meantime, there are plenty of other simulations out there to enjoy! I’ve rediscovered X-Plane 11 recently thanks to some new content and of course IL-2 and DCS World continue to entertain. And if you like doing something a little different, I just wrote about how much fun I was having with Train Sim World 2. This will get sorted out and variety is, as they say, the spice of life.