NVIDIA has officially retired the NVIDIA Control Panel after 20 years, the company announced in a GeForce Driver for 007 First Light blog post. The shutdown applies to both Game Ready and Studio drivers.
NVIDIA RTX PRO users will continue to have support for the Control Panel until the professional features are moved to the NVIDIA app.
Removal does not remove the Control Panel from the existing installation. Users who already have Control Panel installed can continue to use it on their current systems, and it remains available for download through the Microsoft Store for those who prefer the older interface. However, no new features, updates or improvements will be added in the future.
What happens to the existing NVIDIA Control Panel installation?
Users who have a current Control Panel installed will not be able to see software automatically removed from their system.
The application remains on the PC until the user performs a clean installation of the NVIDIA drivers, which will remove the Control Panel. Those who wish to keep Control Panel intact after a clean driver install can still download it from the Microsoft Store.
NVIDIA has confirmed that it will host the legacy software for users who prefer to keep it, but the applications will no longer receive updates.
What this means for NVIDIA app and GPU users as a replacement
NVIDIA recommends that GPU users install the NVIDIA app, which provides the same functions with a redesigned interface. The biggest change for those who use Control Panel is the way the menus are organized. 3D settings, previously under Manage 3D Settings, are now located in Graphics, Program Settings.
Display options and other settings have been moved to the System tab. While the core capabilities are the same as the Control Panel, the layout and navigation have changed. Users transitioning from the Control Panel will need to become familiar with the new structure to access familiar options like resolution, refresh rate, multi-monitor setup, and per-program 3D settings.
For most NVIDIA GPU users, the impact will be gradual. Those who have not installed a clean driver will find that the Control Panel remains unchanged. New users installing the driver for the first time will not get the Control Panel by default and will have to download it separately from the Microsoft Store if they want to use it.
The retirement of Control Panel marks the end of a tool that has been part of NVIDIA drivers since 2006. It has served as the main configuration interface for NVIDIA GPUs across multiple hardware generations and Windows versions.
NVIDIA has not announced a date when professional features will be fully migrated to the NVIDIA app for RTX PRO users, so for now, Control Panel remains the supported tool for that group.
