Cover-Credits:
Background patching is a feature that Riot Games only recently rolled out for the Riot Client. It allows the client to essentially download and install patches, so long as the client is open. The developers talked about this feature in May via a detailed blog post and the update with the background patching feature for the Riot Client is already live. However, this feature will seemingly be rolled out in phases, with the first iteration only working for Valorant.
Here’s all you need to know about this newest auto-download feature for Valorant that happens via background patching in Riot Client.
Background Patching for Valorant
Riot Games acknowledged that it is sometimes tiresome when you want to play some games and wind down from a long day and you see that the game needs to be patched. It said, “Why can’t your game just be ready when you are? Well, wait no more, because we’re bringing you the ability to background patch your games while you’re AFK so that watching update bars becomes a thing of the past.”
When you choose to opt-in for this feature, all your games will be kept up-to-date and ready to play. “Future functionality will also include the ability to have the Riot Client open on startup,” it said on 19th May.
This first version of background patching will only fully update Riot Games’ first-person hero shooter Valorant. Other titles such as League of Legends, Legends of Runeterra, and Teamfight Tactics update partially within their respective game clients and the ability for these games to fully update via background patching is not supported just yet.
However, a part of the patching process for those games does happen in the Riot Client and that part will be supported by background patching, said Riot. This would mean that players have a quicker patching process across all Riot games.
The company also stated that it is working hard to unlock full background patching for League of Legends, Legends of Runeterra, and Teamfight Tactics as soon as possible in the meantime.
How to turn on auto-update for Valorant?
Since the background patching feature is already live this month in June, you should be able to turn it on for Valorant. Here’s how you do it:
Open Riot Games client
Click on the Profile icon on the top right
Select Settings
On the Riot Client tab, make sure that the ‘Open Riot Client on startup’ is selected. This will ensure that the client will run in your system tray upon start so your games are automatically updated in the background.
Now, navigate to the Valorant tab
You will see the following option: Automatic Updates - Valorant will automatically update when Riot Client is running.
Now tick the check box beside the ‘Enable auto-update’ option
Once you have selected these options, the Riot Client will automatically have Valorant downloaded for you the next time a patch releases. You will not have the need to open Valorant client and wait for it to update in front of your eyes.
