How to fix the Cannot queue for matchmaking at this time error in Dota 2

Esports News

August 6, 2024

Marcus Wong

Ever opened your Dota 2 ready to enjoy a good match just to tumble into an error? Yes, it’s the notorious “Cannot queue for matchmaking at this time” error, which can be devastating to see on a Friday night after work.

However, fret not because there are several methods on how to fix the Cannot queue for matchmaking at this time error in Dota 2.

Error “Cannot queue for matchmaking at this time” in Dota 2 (Image credit: Dota 2)

What is the failure to queue for matchmaking error?

This error typically occurs after a new Dota 2 update, and occasionally, you can also encounter it when there’s no updates at all. Unfortunately, the root cause of this error isn’t always the Dota 2 server’s fault, but can also be in your own client.

As such, we will have to go through a series of methods to check which resolves this matchmaking error.

How to fix the Cannot queue for matchmaking at this time error in Dota 2

1. Restart Dota 2

The most straightforward method to fix the “Cannot queue for matchmaking at this time” error is by restarting your Dota 2. You can do that by:

Selecting the Exit button located at the top-right corner of your Dota 2 client. Alternatively, you can go to your Task Manager on your desktop to force-close Dota 2.
Once you have exited, restart Steam too just as an extra precaution.
Open your Dota 2 client again and attempt to find match.

Chances are, there was a recent Dota 2 update and the Dota 2 server is still unstable. You can check the Dota 2 Reddit forum by its most recent posts to see if others are facing the same issue.

2. Check Dota 2 server status

Another extension of checking whether it’s a global outage is by checking the Dota 2 server status. You can check it by visiting SteamDB to check whether the Dota 2 game coordinator is normal or down.

3. Verify Game cache

Occasionally, the error could be because of your game files. You can verify your Dota 2 game cache by:

Open Steam > visit Library > right-click on Dota 2
Select the Properties option > go to Installed Files
Select ‘Verify integrity of game files’.

This takes a couple of minutes to complete, so be patient while it verifies your game cache. At this point, hopefully, your Dota 2 client resolves itself and allows you to find a match.

4. Unable to queue for matchmaking in Dota 2 while running as Administrator

Some of our computers may be running Dota 2 as an administrator, which seems to cause issues when trying to queue for matchmaking. As such, you would have to uncheck this option. You can do this by:

Launching the Dota 2 client, so that it’s running on your Task Manager.
Open the Task Manager > navigate to the Details section.
Find Dota 2 > right-click on it > select “Properties”.
Uncheck the option “Run this program as administrator”.
Confirm the changes and exit Task Manager.
Re-launch Dota 2.

This should resolve this error caused by running Dota 2 as an administrator.

With that, hopefully, it resolves your “Cannot queue for matchmaking at this time” and get you back to grinding MMR in no time.