Microsoft Confirms Windows 11 KB5121003 Update Crashes Games and Reboots PCs

Status at a Glance

Status: Confirmed by Microsoft and under investigation.
Affected update: Windows 11 KB5121003 (Patch Tuesday), released August 11.
Affected builds: 26200.9168 (Windows 11 25H2) and 26100.9168 (Windows 11 24H2).
Symptoms: Game crashes with EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION, unexpected reboots, and Teams and the new Outlook failing on Arm devices.
Error code: Bug check 0x93 INVALID_KERNEL_HANDLE.

Microsoft has confirmed that the Windows 11 KB5121003 update—its latest Patch Tuesday release—is crashing games and forcing some PCs to reboot on their own. According to the company’s Windows release health dashboard, the patch is behind a cluster of crashes and reboots that are leaving gamers and Arm-device users frustrated.

The update shipped on August 11 for builds 26200.9168 and 26100.9168, and Microsoft says it is still working out whether the patch itself or conflicting third-party software is to blame.

#1 Windows 11 KB5121003 crashes games and reboots PCs

The KB5121003 update introduces a bug that surfaces as an EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION error when games try to run, and in some cases the PC reboots automatically right after the crash. Microsoft says the problem affects Windows 11 versions 25H2 and 24H2.

Games affected so far include Arc Raiders, Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls, and The Finals, based on the reports Microsoft has acknowledged.

The trouble started after a Reddit user flagged the issue last week, and others quickly confirmed they were hitting crashes, error messages, and random reboots after installing the update.

One user went a step further, sharing event logs, WER reports, and a kernel dump analysis that suggested the game crashes were actually full system BSODs happening while playing Arc Raiders.

That analysis traced the crashes to a pre-existing “bad-handle bug” that Windows used to quietly ignore—or simply return an error for—when an invalid handle was closed. With the latest update, kernel handle validation has become stricter, so closing an invalid handle now triggers a bug check 0x93 INVALID_KERNEL_HANDLE instead of being swept under the rug.

A close-up of a gaming monitor displaying a blue crash screen with a Windows error dialog, dimly lit gaming room with bl — A blue crash screen on a gaming monitor, one of the symptoms users report after the update.

#2 Teams and new Outlook break on Arm devices

The crash reports are only part of the story. According to a Microsoft Learn post by Brian Stringfellow, Teams and the new Outlook have stopped working on Arm devices after installing KB5121003.

On the affected machines, Teams crashes shortly after opening, and the new Outlook fails to launch entirely—though the classic Outlook app keeps working as expected.

Stringfellow traced the problem to a Snapdragon-powered Microsoft Surface Laptop 7th Edition. He noted that the same failure appeared earlier this year after installing KB5094126 and was resolved by rolling back that update, but it has now returned with the latest release.

Other users have reported the same breakage on the HP OmniBook 3 and Surface Pro 11, both of which use Arm64 processors.

An Arm-based laptop open on a clean desk with Outlook and Teams icons showing a broken error state, soft warm ambient li — Teams and Outlook apps failing on an Arm laptop, showing the second symptom of the update.

Workarounds and Microsoft’s fix status

Microsoft has not issued an official workaround or a replacement patch, but several users have shared steps that appear to have helped them:

Roll back KB5121003 using DISM, which one user says stopped the crashes.
Pause Windows Update for up to one month to keep the update from automatically reinstalling.
As a longer-term fix, remove old drivers tied to the bad-handle bug, which one user recommends as a permanent solution.
On affected Arm devices, stick with the classic Outlook app while Teams and the new Outlook remain broken.

These steps are user-reported rather than endorsed by Microsoft, so results may vary. As of now, there is no official fix or workaround. Microsoft has confirmed the game-crash issue on Windows 11 25H2 and 24H2 and is still investigating, but it has not responded to the separate reports about Teams and the new Outlook failing on Arm devices.

What This Means for You

If you are running Windows 11 25H2 or 24H2 and play games, you may want to hold off on anything that depends on the update until Microsoft clarifies what is happening. The crashes are tied to how the patch handles kernel objects, so they tend to hit certain games and drivers rather than every app equally—which is why some users are fine while others see repeated BSODs.

For Arm-device owners, the practical workaround is simple: keep using the classic Outlook app and avoid launching Teams until a fix lands. If you are not affected, there is no urgent reason to rush an uninstall, but pausing Windows Update is a low-risk way to avoid the patch reinstalling itself while Microsoft works on a solution.

How to Get It (or Roll It Back)

The update is being pushed through Windows Update. If you have already installed KB5121003 and are experiencing problems, you can check the Windows release health dashboard for status updates, or pause Windows Update to prevent it from reinstalling.

For those who want to remove it, rolling back via DISM is the user-recommended route, though Microsoft has not officially confirmed this as a supported method. Until the company publishes an official fix, the release health dashboard remains the best single source for tracking progress on both the game-crash and Arm-app issues.

Source: Windows News: Updates, Security Patches, Microsoft OS Changes – gHacks

Over to you: Are you holding off on the Windows 11 update until Microsoft fixes it, or have you already hit one of these crashes?