Steam Downloads Are Slow or Stuck
A game download is barely moving, freezes at the same percentage, or drops to 0 bytes per second and won’t recover.
Why: Usually you’re connected to a busy or distant content server, or the local download cache has gone stale. Switching region and clearing the cache fixes the large majority of slow and stuck downloads.
Fix 1: Change your download region
Steam routes downloads through regional content servers. A nearby or different one is often dramatically faster.
- Open Steam > Settings from the top-left menu.
- Go to the Downloads tab.
- Under Download Region, pick a different server — try the one geographically closest to you, or a nearby major city if yours is overloaded.
- Steam restarts the download; give it a minute to ramp up before judging the speed.
Fix 2: Clear the download cache
A corrupted cache can stall a download at the same spot every time. Clearing it doesn’t delete installed games.
- Open Steam > Settings > Downloads.
- Click Clear Download Cache at the bottom, then Confirm.
- Steam signs you out — log back in, and resume the download.
Fix 3: Confirm you’re reading the speed correctly, then rule out interference
What looks “slow” is sometimes just unit confusion, and some software throttles Steam.
- Steam shows bytes per second; your ISP advertises bits. Multiply Steam’s number by 8 to compare — e.g. 6 MB/s in Steam is about 48 Mbps, which is fast.
- Close other bandwidth-heavy apps (streaming, other downloads, cloud backups).
- Temporarily disable any firewall, antivirus, or VPN, then test — these can interfere with the connection to Steam’s content servers.
FAQ
It’s stuck at exactly the same percentage. That’s the cache — clear it (Fix 2) and resume.
Download starts fast then collapses to near zero. Switch to a different download region (Fix 1); the server you’re on is likely congested.
Speed is fine on websites but slow only in Steam. Try a different region first, then check for a firewall, antivirus, or VPN throttling Steam (Fix 3).
Sources: Steam Support — Slow Downloads and Connection to Content Servers, Steam Support — Clear download cache