Name one thing more annoying than unfair matchmaking in Valorant. We’ll do it for you. It’s the sheer number of bugs, glitches, and error codes that impede playability and don’t let you get past a certain stage in-game. If not the Valorant Error 19, the Val 46 error code has riled up quite the amount of the title’s player base.
The Val 46 error in Valorant, indicating “Platform Downtime,” can occur due to various reasons, including low RAM space, overlaying applications, or account region issues. To resolve it:
- Try logging in later to check if it’s a temporary issue.
- Shut down background processes to improve system speed.
- Disable overlaying apps, especially Discord.
- Consider changing your account region if needed.
- As a last resort, launch the game from the Riot Games launcher.
- Recommended eXputer Read: Valorant Error Code 39.
What is Error Code Val 46?
The image that you see above is just a representation of the error code: Val 46. More often than not, what we have here is an issue that pertains to official server downtime. If you take a look at the compilation of all the error codes over at Valorant Support, you’ll find that error 46 has a fairly simple description right beside it.
It’s common knowledge at this point that the number 46 in the shape of an error means “Platform Downtime.” The only way you can fix it in essence is to try logging in later. The description of the issue on the official website reads, “This is planned downtime allotted for the engineers to work on our systems.”
- In the Meantime: Valorant A Critical Error Has Occurred.
How to Fix Valorant Error Code Val 46
What entails ahead is our curated collection of the most robust potential solutions there are to the Val 46 issue. Do try them all out diligently for nothing but the best results.
Before we get started though, please note that the following fixes take confidence that you’ve already tried rebooting your PC at least 1-3 times already. In the case that you haven’t though, we suggest you perform restarts pronto.
- Also Read: Valorant Error Code Van 6.
Before getting into anything complicated, we recommend double-checking something utterly essential with regard to Valorant. Being a live service title that sports an online-only nature, Valorant has dedicated servers to its name that have to be working all the time for proper playability.
The gist of it is that Valorant developers could have pulled the servers for downtime, so they’re actually working on making your experience better as we speak. A quick and easy to confirm whether this is the actual reason you’re not able to log into the title is by visiting the official Valorant Service Status page.
Let the results define what you’re going to do next, either that’s waiting until playability is resumed or taking the matter into your hands to resolve an issue specific to you. In addition, you can also report the problem directly to the developers using their Submit a Ticket page to get the officials to look at your matter closely.
Shut Down Background Processes
Valorant might not be letting you in as soon as it launches due to insufficient availability of RAM. It’s either that or another software impeding with the functioning of the famous first-person shooter. In this scenario, it might be a huge struggle for the title to be able to do anything at all, let alone start up properly and let you play.
Fire up the Task Manager by pressing “Shift,” “Ctrl,” and “Esc” together to rule out the possibility of the Val 46 error. The following is just an illustration of how you click on a task first and then hit “End task” to lay it to rest.
When you have enough system resources freed up on your device, it’s likely for Valorant to run without crashing on launch. Try playing the game after carefully evaluating the Task Manager to see whether it’s actually playable now.
Disable Overlaying Apps, Especially Discord
Overlaying applications are those that display over other apps or opened processes in Windows 10 and Windows 11. These usually hoard RAM, internal memory, and other useful system resources that otherwise might be preventing Valorant from connecting to the official game servers.
Fire up the Task Manager by pressing the “Shift,” “Alt,” and “Esc” keys together and pick out all concurrently opened overlay applications. To name one, most users have Discord installed on their Windows PC. Make sure you remove its overlay feature or uninstall the application completely to get rid of this issue.
From what we can gather by reading up on Valorant community forums and Reddit posts, it’s almost unreal the number of people who managed to get past the Val error code 46 just by disabling Discord’s overlay feature or shutting it down altogether. Therefore, we advise you to get going here as soon as you can.
Change Your Account Region
Another probable reason that you keep running into Val 46 error code is that you’ve set your account region to a place where you’re not actually playing from. More often than not, this can cause discrepancies between the you and Valorant’s official servers, causing them to mess up and bring you forth that vile error code.
A bunch of users who contacted Valorant Support were told to change their account’s region. Therefore, what you’ll do here is briefly check what country is your account based in. Head over to the “Changing Your Region of Resident for Your Riot Account” page on the official website and log in with your credentials to get started.
However, in the case that you find your account’s region the same as your actual country of residence, skip to the next section. The issue is probably a bit more deep-dyed than we thought.
Spam The WASD Keys Repeatedly At The Title Screen
We’ll be honest with you—what we’re about to say may sound like utter nonsense, but a niche group of similarly troubled players has come forth with this eerie method of making Valorant playable again. The trick, at its core, is utterly simple.
You have to repeatedly press the “W,” “A,” “S,” and “D” keys on your keyboard in that specific order at the error prompt screen. The source of who posted this potential error fix first is unknown but has somehow made its way onto a Reddit threat.
Users replying to the section say that this has been exceptionally surprising. If you spam those keys at the right screen, Valorant loads in instantly. How crazy is that? We urge you to give it a shot as well. After all, what’s the worst that can happen?
However, keep on reading to try other types of fixes in the case that the instructions above didn’t work things out.
Launch The Game From The Riot Games Launcher
If you’ve been trying to play Valorant by launching it from a shortcut icon on your desktop, don’t. Word has it that those trying to seek time-saving approaches here are repeatedly shut down by the error code.
You should ideally launch the Riot Games Launcher on your desktop first and proceed to firing up Valorant accordingly. That will help streamline things and determine the cause of the issue as well. Look for the Riot Games Launcher using the Windows Search menu to get started.
As soon as you get started with the game, see whether you can log in without the Val 46 error popping up. In the case that the issue still doesn’t go away, check out the following subsection for the final trick in the bag.
Do Check Out: Valorant Error Code 57.
Now that we’ve outlined the major potential solutions there are to this tricky scenario, do let us know whether you can finally start playing Valorant or not. As always, eXputer wishes you good luck!
- Before You Go: Games Like Valorant.
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