Discord is an app that provides amazing communication features and services. One of these features is the Discord overlay feature that lets users communicate with their Discord friends while playing a full-screen game. But some users are experiencing an issue where their overlay isn’t showing up during the game. For some, this problem is only for a specific game whereas others are experiencing the overlay not showing issue for every game. This problem is causing a lot of trouble because it’s preventing users from properly communicating and talking to their friends during their gaming sessions.
What causes Discord overlay to not show up?
The list of things that can cause this issue is quite long.
- Game Overlay Option: The most common and the basic thing that causes this issue is the Overlay option itself. A lot of people aren’t familiar with the settings and usually it’s the settings that aren’t configured properly. You have to turn on the overlay option for specific games and you might have to add the game to the Discord game list as well. A lot of people forget that they might have to manually turn on the overlay or that their game might not be added in the Discord game list.
- Antivirus: Antivirus applications are also known to cause some issues with the Discord overlay. Antiviruses might flag the Discord or its overlay feature as suspicious and they might be blocking it.
- Scaled Display: If you have a scaled Windows display then that might be hiding the Discord overlay as well.
- Overlay Location: Since the Discord overlay can be moved around, a lot of people accidentally move it out of the screen. This usually happens when you scale the display as well. For example, if you put the overlay at the edge of the screen and you scaled the display later on then you won’t be able to see the overlay despite it being working properly.
- Hardware Acceleration: Hardware acceleration is the use of computer hardware to perform some functions more efficiently than is possible in software running on a more general-purpose CPU. This feature, if turned on, can cause some problems with the Discord overlay feature as well.
Note
Before you dive deep into the methods given below, it’s worth doing a reboot of the system and/or Discord app. Sometimes it’s a glitch that goes away after a reboot. So, restart the Discord app and check if it fixes the issue or not. If it doesn’t then reboot the whole system and check if that fixes the problem.
Method 1: Turn on Game Overlay
The very first thing that you should do is turn on the overlay option for your game. Even if you are sure that you turned this option on, it’s worth giving a look since there are a couple of things that need to be checked in the overlay and game settings. Follow the steps given below to make sure everything is set up properly to rule out any settings issue.
- Open Discord
- Click on the User Settings (gear icon). This should be on the right side of your avatar.
- Select Overlay from the left pane
- Turn on Enable in-game overlay. It should be on the top of the right pane
- Select Game Activity from the left pane
- Make sure the overlay is turned on for the specific game you are playing. The game should be in a green box in the right pane if the overlay is turned on. You should also be able to see the status “Overlay: On” in front of the game you are playing right now. Note: If the overlay isn’t turned on for your game then click the monitor button in front of your game and this should turn on the overlay.
- If you don’t see your game in the game list then you can add your game as well. Click on Add it! Link from the right pane and select your game’s name from the drop-down menu. Click Add game. Now repeat the steps 6 to turn on Overlay for your newly added game.
Check if this fixes the issue for you.
Method 2: Turn off Hardware Acceleration
Since hardware acceleration can be the culprit behind this issue, disabling this option is the logical thing to do. So, follow the steps given below to turn off the hardware acceleration for Discord app.
- Open Discord
- Click on the User Settings (gear icon). This should be on the right side of your avatar.
- Select Appearance from the left pane
- Scroll down in the right pane and you should be able to see the Hardware Acceleration It should be under the Advanced section
- Toggle off Hardware Acceleration
- You will most likely see a confirmation box. Click Okay. This will reboot the Discord app
That’s it. The issue should be fixed once the Discord app restarts.
Method 3: Rescale the Display
Some users found out that their display was scaled to 105% (or some other percentage) and the only thing they had to do was change the display back to 100%. So, this might be the case for you and the only reason you couldn’t see the overlay was because of a scaled display. All you have to do is scale the display back to the original 100% and everything should work fine.
- Hold Windows key and press I
- Click System
- Select 100% (Recommended) from the drop-down menu under the Scale and Layout section
Once the scaling is done, run the game again. The overlay should be showing up now.
Method 4: Move the Overlay
In some cases, the only issue is the location of the overlay. Since you can move the overlay around, it might have been the case that you accidentally moved the overlay off the screen. If you have tried everything and nothing has worked then the most likely case is that everything is working but you just can’t see the overlay because of its location. So, the only solution here is to relocate the overlay by following the steps given below
- Close the game and open Discord
- Press and Hold CTRL, SHIFT, and I keys (CTRL + SHIFT + I) while you are in the Discord. This should open a javascript console on the right side.
- Click on the >> arrow icon in the top right corner of the javascript console.
- Select Application from the newly created list
- Double click Local Storage from the newly created left panel (or click the arrow beside the Local Storage)
- You should be able to see a newly created entry under the Local Storage. This new entry should be called https:\\discordapp.com. Click it
- Right click on OverlayStore (or OverlayStoreV2). It’s in the middle of the Keys column.
- Select Delete
- Now reboot the Discord.
Launch game. The overlay should be back to its default position and you’ll be able to move it again.
Method 5: Update Discord
Discord gets updates on a pretty regular basis so it might just be the update that introduced this bug in the application. This should be the case if you started experiencing the issue after the update. If the methods mentioned above didn’t solve the issue then, unfortunately, there isn’t anything that we can do. These type of bugs are usually fixed in the next update so the best thing that you can do is to just wait for the Discord update. You don’t have to do anything though, the Discord app will automatically get the update. So just try to open the Discord every now and then to see if the issue is resolved.
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