How to Update Complementary Shaders Without Losing Your Settings

Updating Complementary Shaders should take two minutes, but there is one trap: your carefully tuned settings are stored in a file tied to the pack's filename, and a new release has a new filename. Update carelessly and the new version starts from defaults while your old settings sit orphaned beside it. This guide shows how to update Complementary Shaders without losing your settings, for both Iris and OptiFine.

How your settings are stored

When you change options in the pack's settings screen, the loader saves them to a small text file in the shaderpacks folder, named after the pack file, for example, beside ComplementaryUnbound_r5.9.3.zip you will find ComplementaryUnbound_r5.9.3.zip.txt. That text file is your configuration: profile, lighting choices, water settings, everything.

The consequence is simple. Install r5.9.4 (or any newer name) and the loader looks for ComplementaryUnbound_r5.9.4.zip.txt, does not find it, and starts from defaults. Your old settings are not deleted, they are attached to the old filename. The fix is to carry the file across, as below.

The update, step by step

1. Download the new release for your style, the homepage download section always fetches the current one. Check it against the ZIP checks.
2. Open your shaderpacks folder (in game: Video Settings → Shaders → Open Folder, or use the paths in where to put the ZIP).
3. Copy the new ZIP in, next to the old one. Do not delete the old ZIP yet.
4. Carry the settings: find the old options file (old filename + .txt). Make a copy of it and rename the copy to the new filename + .txt, for example, copy ComplementaryUnbound_r5.9.3.zip.txt to ComplementaryUnbound_r5.9.4.zip.txt. Keep the original untouched as your backup.
5. In game, select the new pack in the shader list and open its settings: your profile and options should be exactly as you left them.
6. Verify in a world, then, only after a session or two confirms all is well, delete the old ZIP and its options file if you want the folder tidy.

When settings reset anyway

• A major generation change. Across big updates, options are sometimes renamed, added or retired. The loader keeps what it recognises and defaults the rest. After a major update, skim the settings screens once to see what is new, the release history shows how large your jump was.
• The options file was edited by hand and has an error. The loader falls back to defaults rather than crash. Restore your backup copy.
• You renamed the pack ZIP. Renaming breaks the filename link to the options file. Rename the .txt to match, or keep original filenames, the simplest policy.

Habits that make updates painless

• Keep one backup: a copy of your current options file (or a note of your key settings) somewhere outside the shaderpacks folder. It is a tiny text file; email it to yourself or drop it in a documents folder.
• Update in small steps. The release pattern is a feature update followed by small revisions (r5.9 → r5.9.1 → r5.9.2 → r5.9.3). Updating every revision or two keeps jumps small and surprises smaller.
• Never overwrite blindly: always add the new file beside the old, verify, then clean up. Disk cost is half a megabyte; regret costs an evening of re-tuning.
• Update the loader deliberately, not accidentally: a new Minecraft version needs a matching loader; treat game, loader and shader updates as three separate decisions, see fixing shaders after a Minecraft update.

Checking the new release before you touch anything

A calm update starts before any file moves. Confirm what you have actually downloaded: the filename should name your style and the new release, the current release is r5.9.3, so expect ComplementaryUnbound_r5.9.3.zip or ComplementaryReimagined_r5.9.3.zip, and the file should be roughly 0.53 MB, still zipped, from a legitimate source. Run the ZIP checks now rather than after a confusing first launch; a wrong-style file, an old release re-downloaded by mistake, or a damaged download all present later as "my settings vanished" or "the update changed nothing," when the real story is that the new pack was never the file you thought it was. Also note the size of the jump you are making. The release history shows the pattern of a feature release followed by small revisions; stepping from r5.9.2 to r5.9.3 is a small move where settings carry across almost invisibly, while jumping several releases at once is where renamed or retired options are more likely, and where the post-update skim of the settings screens below matters most. Finally, decide your rollback position first: as long as the old ZIP and its .txt remain, going back is a menu selection. Tidy up last.

Do not update the game, the loader and the pack at the same time

The settings trap gets the attention, but the commonest way an update goes wrong is bundling three changes into one evening. A new Minecraft version needs a loader build that matches it exactly; a new loader changes how packs are presented; a new pack release changes options and defaults. Any one of these can produce a symptom, a missing shader menu, a black screen, reset settings, and if all three changed at once, the symptom has three possible authors and no test can separate them. Sequence the work instead. If Minecraft updated, first get the matching Iris or OptiFine running on the new version and confirm your existing pack still loads with its settings intact; only then, in a separate session, swap in the new pack release using the steps above. If only the pack released a new version, change nothing else that day. This discipline is also why the pack's broad supported range, Minecraft Java 1.7.10 through 1.21.11 and 26.1–26.3, is so convenient: the pack almost never forces your hand, so you are free to let game and loader updates settle before deciding whether you even want the newest pack release yet. Fixing shaders after a Minecraft update covers the recovery side when a bundled update has already happened.

Unbound settings are not Reimagined settings

One transfer the rename trick must never be used for is between styles. Unbound and Reimagined are separate packs with separate options files, and each style's settings only make sense for that style, its profiles, lighting choices and atmosphere options were tuned against a different visual design, the realistic one in Unbound's case and the vanilla-preserving one in Reimagined's. Copying Unbound's .txt and renaming it for Reimagined does not import a look; it imports a list of values the other pack will partly recognise, partly default, and wholly fail to interpret as you intended. When you update, carry each style's file to its own style's new release, and when you adopt the second style for the first time, let it start from its own defaults and profile, then tune it on its own terms, the switching guide explains how the two setups coexist. The same caution applies between computers with different profiles: copying a settings file is legitimate and useful, but copy it as a starting point to verify in a familiar scene, not as a guarantee that one machine's tuning suits another's hardware.

Rolling back when the new release disappoints

If the new version misbehaves, looks wrong to you, or simply is not to your taste, rolling back is deliberately boring, provided you followed the add-beside, verify, then clean up order. The old ZIP is still in the shaderpacks folder and still listed in the shader menu; select it, and the game renders with the old release again. Its settings are exactly where you left them, because its .txt file was never touched, your backup copy of the settings, made during the update, was the safety net you did not need. Play a session on the old release to confirm the problem belongs to the new version, then decide: keep both entries and retry later, or remove the new ZIP and its .txt together and wait for the next revision.

Frequently asked questions