This is the most common fix for Slack freezes. Hardware acceleration shifts graphical tasks to your GPU, which can cause instability if there are driver conflicts.

Windows 11 comes with Microsoft Defender, which is generally efficient, but it can still interfere. Slack constantly reads and writes cache files, database files (for your workspace data), and temporary files. If your antivirus solution (including third-party suites like McAfee, Norton, or even aggressive Defender settings) decides to scan every one of those operations, it creates a lock on the file. Slack’s process waits for that lock. Deadlock. Freeze.

The most common cause of Slack freezing on Windows 11 is hardware acceleration. This feature offloads graphics rendering from the CPU to the GPU, which should make animations smoother and scrolling faster. However, Windows 11’s WDDM 3.0 driver model and the myriad of GPU drivers (Intel, AMD, NVIDIA) often have subtle bugs. When Slack tries to leverage the GPU for rendering complex emojis, animated GIFs, or large message threads, the driver can hang, causing the entire app to freeze.