What Is Shader Cache — and Is It Safe to Delete?

Updated June 2026 · 4 min read

If you've gone looking for disk space, you've probably hit a folder called shadercache quietly eating gigabytes. Here's what it is and whether you can wipe it.

What a shader cache actually is

Shaders are small programs that tell your GPU how to draw surfaces — light, shadow, water, skin. Compiling them on the fly causes stutter, so your GPU driver and Steam pre-compile and store them on disk. That stored result is the shader cache. The payoff is smoother first-time loading of scenes.

Why it grows so large

Every game, driver update, and hardware change can generate new shaders. Old caches aren't always cleaned up, so the folder accumulates — tens of GB across a big library isn't unusual.

Is it safe to delete?

Yes. Shader cache is derived data — nothing in it is unique or irreplaceable. Delete it and the game simply rebuilds what it needs on the next launch. The only cost: the first session afterward may have brief extra stutter while shaders recompile. No saves, no settings, no game files are affected.

Where it lives

Steam: steamapps/shadercache inside each library folder.
NVIDIA driver cache: managed via the NVIDIA App (Shader Cache Size). Setting it back to driver default clears the overflow.

Should you delete it regularly?

Only when you actually need the space. The cache exists to help performance, so wiping it constantly just makes the game recompile every time. Clear it when a drive is full or after a big driver change — not as a daily ritual.

GameCleaner measures shader cache per game and clears it safely with one click — dry-run first, so you always see what you'll free before anything is deleted. Get early access →