Intel's latest Arc update cuts game load times by up to 3x by adding pre-compiled shaders, and it already supports 13 games

Microsoft recently announced that it plans to address shader compilation stutter by bringing Advanced Shader Delivery for Windows to PC. After NVIDIA confirmed that it will be available for GeForce RTX gamers, Intel has now joined the list of GPU vendors working on enabling this technology for its Arc GPUs.

Intel has rolled out its Graphics Shader Distribution Service in the 32.0.101.8626 WHQL Game On driver, which the company says will improve first-time load times by up to 2x on Arc B-series graphics cards and Intel Core Ultra Series 2 and Series 3 processors with integrated Arc graphics.

These significant performance bumps come from automatically downloading pre-compiled shaders for your games, so you don't have to stare at your screen each time the game compiles shaders. There is cloud infrastructure in the background doing the heavy lifting, but for gamers, it all comes down to one thing: reduced stuttering on first launch.

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The technology is referred to by different names across Intel's pages. The Arc gaming technologies page calls it Precompiled Shader Distribution, while the new driver notes call the shipping feature Graphics Shader Distribution Service, though it's all referring to the same thing.

Intel already has 13 supported Steam games for the tech, with several yielding even more than 2x faster load times. God of War Ragnarok leads the pack with a massive 21x uplift on the Intel Arc B580, with integrated GPUs, such as the B390 (2x faster) and 140V (3x faster), also taking full advantage of the pre-complied shaders. Here's the full list of games:

• Black Myth: Wukong
• Borderlands 4
• Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
• Call of Duty®: Black Ops 7
• Cyberpunk 2077
• God of War Ragnarök
• Gotham Knights
• Hogwarts Legacy
• NBA 2K26
• Starfield
• T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered
• The Outer Worlds 2

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To enable precompiled shaders, you will have to open the Intel Graphics Software utility and toggle the Precompiled Shaders option, which is disabled by default. That said, the feature is in Beta so expect some minor hiccups, if any, and it currently works exclusively with games installed through the Steam Games Store.