VAN 45 appears when Vanguard itself fails to start or is stopped by another process. It is distinct from driver-related VAN codes: the driver may be loaded but the Vanguard process (vgtray.exe) is not running or was blocked.
What does Valorant VAN 45 mean?
Valorant checks for an active Vanguard process before allowing you to queue. VAN 45 means that check failed — Vanguard either was not started, crashed after starting, or was blocked by security software that prevents its userspace process from running.
Conflicts with third-party software
Software that monitors or restricts process creation (some parental controls, endpoint security products, and aggressive antivirus solutions) can prevent Vanguard from launching its process. This is a common cause of VAN 45 on corporate or family-controlled PCs.
Manual Vanguard restart
Unlike driver-level errors, VAN 45 can sometimes be fixed without a full reboot — right-clicking the Vanguard system tray icon and choosing Restart will attempt to relaunch the Vanguard process and resolve the error if the process simply crashed.
How to fix step by step
- 1Right-click the Vanguard system tray icon and select Restart.
- 2If no tray icon is visible, open Task Manager, end any vgc or vgtray processes, then restart Riot Client.
- 3Restart your PC if a manual restart does not work.
- 4Check that antivirus or endpoint security software is not blocking vgtray.exe.
- 5Temporarily disable parental control software and test.
- 6Ensure no system policy (Group Policy) is blocking unsigned drivers or restricting the Vanguard service.
- 7Reinstall Vanguard from Riot Client settings if the process repeatedly fails to start.
How VAN-45 differs from related codes
- Error VAN-1: Vanguard, Valorant's anti-cheat system, is not running or failed to initialize, so your client is not authorized to launch a match. (user-side)
- Error VAN-39: Vanguard's kernel driver is not loaded, is outdated, or requires a system restart to activate after an update. (user-side)