Valheim Incompatible Version Error Fix

Valheim players have been experiencing a nasty issue where it doesn’t let them play with friends due to incompatible versions. If you get this message, it means the game can’t connect to the server due to the fact that one has been updated past the other. It’s an easy problem to solve, but it’s a bother nontheless. This guide will show you the Valheim incompatible version error fix.

How to fix incompatible version in Valheim?

If you’re just a guest on the server, it’s simply a matter of updating the game. It should update automatically, but sometimes it schedules updates for weird times when it thinks you’re asleep, so you might need to force it. Just find the game in your Staem library, right click on it and select “properties”. Click on “updates”, then choose to download and install updates.

If it’s the server that needs updating, the process is a bit more involved. Here’s how to create a script for force-updating the server, so you can just run that every time you get the error:

1. Download and install SteamCMD. You can get it from here.
2. Go to the folder where you’ve installed Valheim and create an empty text file. Call it Update and change its extension from .txt to .bat.
3. Open up the file and type the following: (address of the SteamCMD folder) + login anonymous + force_install_dir (address of Valheim folder) + app_update 896660 validate + exit.
4. Double-click the file to run it and update the server.

Now every time you get the Valheim incompatible version error, you can simply force the game to update via Steam, and force the server to update by running the script you just made. It’s a bit of work the first time you do it, but you’re frontloading the costs of never having to deal with this issue again for longer than 5 seconds – I’d say it’s worth it.