AppImage - Not Detecting Hardware Encoding/Decoding

[jajabro1]

What happened?

When opening the AppImage on Linux, the app does not detect hardware acceleration and only gives options for CPU (software) options. As we know, software is not as fast or as good at least on my CPU and so the stream is not as good as the GeForceNOW app for Linux. I know though, at the same time, that I'm a bit on the fringe since I use OpenSUSE Tumbleweed which could be causing some issues with detection on it's rolling release. I did read you are working on a flatpak in some of the other issues this could potentially resolve the problem but I thought I would bring it up in case there was a known fix.

I've tried a plethora of parameter changes to try and force it seeing my NVIDIA card to no avail.

Steps:

1. Open OpenNOW
2. Go to Settings
3. See Codec Diagnostic
4. See only CPU Decode and Encode for H264 and AV1 while missing H265
5. Retest- to same results.
6. Forcing Hardware Encoder/Decoder up in the stream settings, and restarting the app does nothing to change results.

PC Hardware and info:
CPU: Ryzen 7 3800X
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Founders (Proprietary Drivers on Tumbleweed)
OS: Linux (OpenSUSE Tumbleweed)
OpenNOW Software, issue present: V0.3.3 to v0.3.5

I will attach both logs from today when updating to v0.3.5 and from before with more troubleshooting done with parameter arguments launching the appImage from terminal trying to fix it.

Operating System

Linux

GeForce NOW Tier

Ultimate

Logs (required)

OpenNOW Logs Export
Generated: 2026-04-14T14:39:21.620Z
Source: main
Total Entries: 10
============================================================

2026-04-14T14:35:32.144Z   LOG [CACHE] Initialized cache directory: /home/jajabro1/.config/opennow-stable/gfn-cache
2026-04-14T14:35:32.468Z   LOG [main] Resolved membership tier: ULTIMATE
2026-04-14T14:35:32.493Z   LOG [CACHE] RefreshScheduler initialized (interval: 720 minutes)
2026-04-14T14:35:32.493Z   LOG [CACHE] Starting RefreshScheduler
2026-04-14T14:35:32.493Z   LOG [CACHE] Auth context not available, skipping refresh
2026-04-14T14:35:40.790Z   LOG [main] Loaded 14 providers
2026-04-14T14:35:41.062Z   LOG [CACHE] Auth context updated for refresh scheduler
2026-04-14T14:35:41.070Z   LOG [CACHE] Cache hit: games:main (age: 729s)
2026-04-14T14:35:41.093Z   LOG [CACHE] Auth context updated for refresh scheduler
2026-04-14T14:35:41.093Z   LOG [CACHE] Cache hit: games:library (age: 736s)

Screenshots (optional)

opennow-logs-2026-04-07T20-38-44-586Z.txt
opennow-logs-2026-04-14T14-39-21-622Z.txt

[zaloguj12]

I think it's the OS that's the reason. I also used OpenSUSE Tumbleweed and it only said CPU. But like Windows it says my GPU supports some codecs.

[zortos293]

it looks like the issue about the os

some distro's dont have codecs installed or you need to install it separately due to licensing issues

for me cachyos worked due to it already being preinstalled look into if your distro has the codecs installed

[zortos293]

could help?
https://opensuse-guide.org/codecs.php

[zortos293]

https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:Installing_codecs_from_Packman_repositories

[jajabro1]

Nope no luck.
Installed codecs package via OPI as recommended by the Tumbleweed community:

sudo zypper in opi
sudo opi codecs

and letting it do it's thing and nothing has changed in the appImage for OpenNOW. Still software only encode/decode.

Attaching new log files and screen shot of the Codec Diagnostics that don't look any different.

opennow-logs-2026-04-16T16-42-42-255Z.txt

I think this will ultimately be sorted out when you do get a flatpak working since it'll mostly all be self-contained. But then the AppImage isn't completely compatible with "linux" so figuring out what dependencies are needed is important. I installed all Codecs available though opi and no difference. So either, AppImage is calling something that is potentially named something different or it's calling something that wasn't included? I'm not Dev, so I'm just guessing.

[zaloguj12]

maybe try setting it in the settings and starting a session? if that doesnt work maybe your drivers might be bad but idk

[jajabro1]

maybe try setting it in the settings and starting a session? if that doesnt work maybe your drivers might be bad but idk

Tried that already, setting the toggles to hardware doesn't change anything. Drivers can't be bad if I'm playing games through Steam just fine with zero problems and not to mention the official GeForce NOW flatpak works just fine (though its a flatpak and not an appImage).

[zortos293]

i will look into flatpak support that should fix the issues