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What graphics card do I have? How to check your GPU and drivers


A woman wearing headphones, using a laptop

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It is important to keep your system up to date. Of course, Windows Update is your first line of defense. You always want to make sure your PC is up to date, especially when new zero-day security flaws are found and Patches are released.

But your computer’s graphics subsystem often needs special attention of its own. Whether you’re running a tower computer with a bunch of cards you installed yourself or a sealed laptop, there’s an internal graphics system that powers your display.

This system is called the GPU or graphics processing unit and it is responsible for loading the frames on your screen as fast as possible.

Strong players often spend hundreds, even thousands of dollars on GPUs. Some PCs can even run two or three GPUs at the same time. For our purposes, we’ll focus on finding out which GPU is installed and how to update it, assuming it’s just one GPU. If you’re rocking something more complex or powerful, let us know in the comments section below.

Another thing to note: GPUs are often referred to as graphics cards because tower PCs are often built using separate tags. Laptops sometimes have gamer-quality graphics, but instead of discrete discrete cards, they are chipsets installed on the laptop’s motherboard. In any case, they all make the pixels move fast.

And with that, let’s dive in.

Also: Top Nvidia and AMD GPUs for your next upgrade or new build

What graphics card do I have? How to check your GPU and drivers

Let’s start to see what graphics system you’re running. This can be a separate card or chipset in your machine. Either way, these steps work.

Click the Windows Start button, which will give you a search and selection box.

Windows start menu icon with red arrow pointing at it

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

You can also type Setting Click the search bar at the top if you don’t see the Settings icon.

The red arrow points to the settings icon

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

This will give you a bunch of options for managing your display. From here, you’ll be able to find out what type of graphics card you’re using and update your drivers.

The red arrow points to the Show button

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET
The red arrow points to the Advanced screen

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

You can choose your display. Some PCs have more than one display system, so you can select that from the menu marked with an arrow. Each display system will have a graphics subsystem. If you look at mine, you can see it next to it Connect with , which describes the actual graphics adapter you are using. On my laptop I am using integrated Intel Iris graphics system.

Internal display information is marked with a red box and an arrow

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

Update the graphics driver

Now that you know what graphics system you’re running, you can download and update your drivers. First we will look at how to perform automatic updates. Not all graphics systems will update this way, so we’ll show you how to download drivers from some of the larger vendors.

Still on the Advanced Display pane, let’s get started.

1. Open Display Adapter Properties

Click on the blue text link (in our case it says, Display adapter properties for 1 . Monitor) to open the first detail panel.

Arrow points to Display adapter properties for Display 1

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

2. Open driver properties

Next, click the Properties button on the pop-up pane. This will open another pop-up and here you want to tap on the Drivers tab.

The red arrow points to Controllers and Properties

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

3. Try automatic update

Click Update drivers and then click Automatically search for drivers. This will make Windows see if it can find a new set of drivers.

The red arrow points to Auto search for drivers

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

Also: Yes, you can still get a free Windows 10 upgrade. This is the way

4. Get Driver Status

In my case, Windows thinks I have the latest drivers. If I don’t, Windows invites me to install an updater. But that’s not the only way to get a driver. Next, we’ll take a look at manually downloading drivers from their support sites.

Driver status popup

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

Manually download drivers

One of the most effective ways to update your computer is to visit the vendor’s website and download the driver. I usually recommend going to your PC vendor first, before the graphics adapter manufacturer. That’s because drivers from PC vendors often take into account other hardware elements of your computer that the graphics vendor may not be aware of. In my case I have an Asus laptop.

1. Visit your supplier’s website

Most PC vendors have websites, and most of those sites have a Help button, which usually includes drivers and other downloadable items. This is Asus version:

ASUS website with arrow pointing to Drivers and Manuals

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

2. Enter model information

Many vendor sites ask you to choose a product category, then drill down into the model. Just follow the prompts and give the website the information it asks for.

ASUS download page

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

3. Go to the graphics card provider’s website

Also, visit the driver download pages for graphics card vendors. The big three are Nvidia, AMD, and Intel. Intel provides a support assistant check your PC directly and suggest downloads.

Intel Support and Driver Support Page

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

This is Nvidia download page:

Nvidia driver download page

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

And here is AMD’s download page:

AMD Drivers and Support Page

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

Also: The best Windows laptop

4. Install the driver manually

Return to the Advanced Display pane, this time select Browse my computer for drivers. Select the driver file you installed and let Windows do its job.

The red arrow points to Browse my computer for drivers

Screenshots by David Gewirtz / ZDNET

And there you go. Two separate ways to check and install drivers on your PC.

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