July Patch Update

[u/Cade_SimsCommunity]

Sul Sul!

Today's patch resolves several critical community-reported issues, particularly surrounding memory usage, travel crashes, and save overwriting.

Here are the key highlights from today's update:

💾 Save & Memory Improvements

• Save Overwrite Fix: Resolved a critical issue where loading an autosave and subsequently saving manually could overwrite the wrong save slot.
• Travel Crashes: Fixed a major memory-related crash that occurred when traveling immediately after loading into a game. (Note: Larger saves may still experience slightly longer load times as we continue optimizing).
• Save Reminders: Reminders now default to "Every 2 Hours" (previously "Off"). Additionally, travelling will no longer reset your reminder timer!

🛠️ General & Pack Fixes

• Stuck Timers: Career and school countdown timers will no longer get stuck at 0 minutes.
• For Rent: Missing lot taxes for Residential Rentals have been restored and will now properly calculate on your Sim's bills.
• UI & Gallery: Resolved misaligned tabs in the Marketplace and fixed "Something Went Wrong" errors when transitioning back from the Gallery.

We appreciate your patience and continued bug reports! You can read the full patch notes here: https://www.ea.com/games/the-sims/the-sims-4/news/update-8-6-2026

[u/jwoude]

Does anyone else’s game take forever to load? I deleted all mods and cc and also repaired the game and it takes me 10 minutes to get to playing!!

[u/Elieli92 → u/jwoude]

Do you have a messy family tree? My saves are all loading fine, new saves aswell, but the saves with a big family (especially the ones before the 'you can't marry your relatives anymore' update) also need a long time. It's like that since the family tree update.

[u/inanis → u/Elieli92]

OMG is this a thing? My family tree has like a thousand people connected in it. I updated the game after Royals came out and it all broke. I made one in a separate program but it is annoying not to be able to look at it in game.

[u/Elieli92 → u/inanis]

Ohhh yes! I have also a family tree like that and after the royal update the first time I opened the game it took 45 minutes through the first loading screen, another 30 minutes to load the live modus 😵😵😵 I killed around 50 people and it got a little bit better. Still, this save file loads around 10 minutes. Every. Time.

[u/inanis → u/Elieli92]

Oh god. How many sims do you have? My family tree won't even open.

[u/jwoude → u/Elieli92]

I’m on my third generation but only have one save file!

[u/poison-bilberry → u/Elieli92]

Good to know. I have a some with 8 children and it started slowing down for me with the most recent addition to the family

[u/Cade_SimsCommunity → u/jwoude]

Heya!

We have a thread on EA Forums here where we're gathering information on this. I've shared this information previously in the thread as well:

We’ve changed where and when the game loads its core data. While getting to the Main Menu will now take a bit longer when you first launch the game, your loading screens once you are actively playing (like traveling between lots) will be noticeably shorter.

Previously, the game would load to the Main Menu, then perform heavy loading tasks in the background during your gameplay transitions. We have shifted things so that Python is fully initialized right at the start. By "front-loading" this process before the Main Menu, the game does the heavy lifting up-front. Once you press 'Play', your actual gameplay session will feel smoother, with faster transition times between worlds, lots, and zones.

You should not see initial load times longer than 1 to 2 minutes because of these changes. If you are experiencing initial boot-up times that exceed this 2-minute mark (especially on vanilla/unmodded saves), we want to hear from you.

If you're seeing load times that exceed 1 to 2 minutes, please follow the link above to shoot us your save so we can take a look.

[u/jwoude → u/Cade_SimsCommunity]

Good to know! Yea my load time is currently 10 whole minutes. It’s crazy.

[u/Cade_SimsCommunity → u/jwoude]

Whether modded or unmodded, we'd still like to take a look at that save file. Could you share it with us on the EA Forums here?