steam updated a game overnight and now it’s broken. the update was optional and i wasn’t ready for it.
want to stop this from happening again, at least for specific games where i want to control the update timing. don’t want to disable updates entirely, just want them to not happen automatically without me choosing to run them.
can you actually do this on a per-game basis in steam? i know there’s something in game properties but the options weren’t obvious to me when i looked.
also: if a game is set to not auto-update, does that cause any issues with multiplayer or anti-cheat? worth knowing before i change settings across my library.
The “only update when I launch it” setting is the right balance for most use cases. You’re not preventing updates – you’re just deferring them to a time you control. The game updates right before you play it, which means you always have the latest version but on your schedule rather than Steam’s.
pausing downloads from the system tray being the quick option is underused. if you’re about to start gaming and see steam starting a large update on something, tray icon > pause downloads stops it immediately without going into settings. resume later when you’re done.
The .acf manifest edit for preventing updates is a legitimate power user technique but comes with the caveat that Steam can reset it. It’s useful for preserving a specific game version for compatibility reasons – like keeping an older version of a game that worked with a specific mod before an update broke compatibility.
steam auto-update settings work per-game and at the library level.
per-game settings: right-click the game in your library > Properties > Updates tab. the “Automatic Updates” dropdown has three options: Always keep this game updated, Only update this game when I launch it, and High Priority (always auto-update). set it to “Only update this game when I launch it” to stop background updates.
this means steam will prompt you to update before launching rather than doing it automatically overnight.
for multiplayer and anti-cheat: most competitive games require the current version to connect to servers. if you delay an update, you generally can’t play online until you update. anti-cheat systems like EasyAntiCheat and BattlEye also check version on launch. delaying updates effectively means delaying multiplayer access for those games.
the system-wide setting (Steam > Settings > Downloads) controls whether downloads happen during active use or only during off-hours, but doesn’t stop automatic updates entirely. the per-game setting is the actual control.
if you want to completely freeze a game at a specific version for compatibility reasons, that requires using steam betas/branches or tools outside steam. the built-in settings only let you delay, not prevent.
High priority update option being available per game is useful when you know a specific game has an important update. Rather than waiting for Steam to get to it in queue, setting it to high priority ensures it updates before your other pending games. Good to know when a patch fixes something you’re waiting on.