5 ways to fix "Nvidia display settings are not available" error on Windows (2024)

The graphics card is one of the most important components for any gaming PC, and that's exactly why running into GPU-related issues is so frustrating. Fortunately, if you have a video card from Nvidia, using the Nvidia Control Panel makes dealing with these issues a bit easier. It offers several useful options and features that are still missing on other Nvidia companion apps, making it a must-have utility on your PC.

With that said, it's not very intuitive, and you might run into errors such as "Nvidia display settings are not available." There could be a few reasons why you may see this particular error on your Windows PC, so it's hard to tell what exactly is causing it. Thankfully, there are a few different things you can try to get rid of this error, and they're all fairly simple and straightforward.

1. Check your display connections

Try this before moving to other troubleshooting methods

The first thing you need to do is to ensure that your display is plugged properly into your Nvidia graphics card. This is crucial because the Nvidia Control Panel won't recognize your display if it's not properly plugged in, resulting in various errors, including the one we're trying to solve here.

Your PC, in case you're wondering, has several display ports, and you must ensure you've connected your monitor's display cable to the Nvidia graphics card's (discrete) port. The GPU will usually have a mix of HDMI and DisplayPort video outputs, so make sure you're plugged into one of these securely. Restart your PC after you've established the right connection to see if it fixed the error. Alternatively, you can also try to use a different port on your graphics card to see if that fixes the error. Doing this will ensure that you're not using a bad port that's causing this issue to begin with.

2. Enable all Nvidia services

Services that ensure smooth functioning

There are several Nvidia services running on your Windows PC at any given point that manage the display driver. They include:

• NVIDIA Display Container LS
• NVIDIA Telemetry Container
• NVIDIA LocalSystem Container
• NVIDIA NetworkService Container

These services ensure your graphics card and the Windows OS have no communication issues, so it's crucial to have these services running properly. Your Nvidia graphics driver and the Nvidia Control Panel may have some trouble working properly if one or more of these services aren't working. To ensure the aforementioned services are working properly:

1. Press Win + R to open the Run program.
2. Type services.msc in the search bar, and hit Enter.

   

3. Look for the services from the aforementioned list.

   

4. Right-click on the service, and select Properties.

   

5. Click the dropdown menu next to the Startup Type, and set it to Automatic.

   

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6. Click the Stop button located under the Service Status tab, and then click Start after a few seconds.

   

7. Click and Apply and OK to save your changes.

   

3. Disable and re-enable the graphics card

Another simple, yet potential fix

A quick way to resolve pesky software errors is by disabling or restarting the associated hardware itself. In this case, you can try to disable and re-enable the Nvidia graphics card that's installed on your PC to see if it fixes the issue.

1. Press the Windows key on your keyboard, and type Device Manager.

   

2. Open Device Manager, and expand the Display adapters section.

   

3. Locate your Nvidia graphics card, right-click on it, and select Disable device.

   

4. Restart your PC.
5. Repeat the steps from 1 to 3, but select Enable device this time.
6. Restart your PC, and see if it fixes the issue.
7. If you don't have integrated graphics and get a black screen after restarting your PC, boot into Safe Mode and enable your graphics card from there.

4. Update Nvidia graphics card drivers

All you may need is a simple update

A simple graphics driver update is all it takes to fix a lot of GPU-related issues. This is particularly true if you haven't updated the graphics driver of your PC, so consider this as a sign to breathe a new life into your Nvidia graphics card. To update the graphics card driver manually:

1. Go to Nvidia's driver download center on the website.
2. Select the required fields for your GPU, your OS, and the correct type of drivers. For GeForce GPUs, you'll have Game Ready Driver and Studio Driver options.

   

3. Click Search to find the latest driver available.
4. Click Download to begin downloading the driver.
5. Run the installer on your PC and follow the on-screen instructions to extract the installer.
6. Choose whether to install the Graphics Driver and GeForce Experience or just the driver itself. Click Agree and continue.

   

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7. Choose the Express install to go with default settings or the Custom install if you want to change settings.
8. Follow the on-screen instructions, wait for the process to finish, and click Close.

If just updating doesn't work, you might need to perform a completely fresh install for the Nvidia drivers. This process is very similar to just updating the drivers, with the major difference being that you need to uninstall to remove the pre-existing drivers first.

5. Roll back graphics card drivers

Not the most straightforward fix

The "Nvidia display settings are not available" error could also be a result of just a bad graphics driver, and there's a good chance that a new driver that you may have downloaded and installed on your Windows may have triggered it. If the error popped up after updating a graphics driver, then you might want to roll things back to see if it fixes the error. Here's how to roll back Nvidia drivers with Device Manager.

1. Press the Start button on your Windows PC, look up Device Manager and click on the result.

   

2. Double-click the Display Adapter option to reveal the graphics cards or chips installed on your PC.

   

3. Right-click the Nvidia graphics card on the list and select Properties.

   

4. Select the Drivers tab.
5. Select the Roll Back Driver option.

   

6. Choose the reason when prompted, and confirm your selection by pressing Yes.

   

Hope Nvidia gets rid of the Control Panel someday, along with all of its problems

Nvidia's Control Panel may have some important options and tools to help your GPU perform better, but it's no secret that it's a crusty old app that's losing its charm among all the other modern programs that we have. The company's new Nvidia App is expected to merge the GeForce Experience and all the Control Panel options to serve as a one-stop solution, but it's not ready for prime time just yet.

Let's hope the Nvidia App will deliver us a much better experience overall someday, and we won't have to deal with many of these annoying Control Panel issues. For now, though, you can try one of the aforementioned troubleshooting methods to see if it fixes the "Nvidia display settings are not available" error on Windows.