I still remember the exact moment I got the VAN 152 error. I'd just finished a ranked session, closed the game, came back the next morning — and Valorant wouldn't launch. Not a soft ban. Not a 30-day suspension. A full hardware ban, meaning every single account I'd ever create on that machine was dead on arrival.
What made it worse? I hadn't even been cheating. I'd bought a secondhand PC from a guy on Facebook Marketplace, and apparently the previous owner had a history with Riot's anti-cheat. That was their problem. Somehow it became mine.
So I spent the better part of three months in 2025 testing every Valorant HWID spoofer I could find — free tools, paid subscriptions, obscure GitHub releases, the whole mess. I ran tests across 4 machines, tried 12+ different tools, and tracked results in a spreadsheet like the obsessive nerd I apparently am.
Here's what I found — and more importantly, here's the only approach that actually works in 2026.
Let's clear something up first, because there's a lot of confusion around this.
A regular account ban means Riot suspended your Riot account. You can make a new one. Annoying, sure, but survivable. An HWID ban — hardware ID ban — is a completely different beast. Riot's anti-cheat, Vanguard, has fingerprinted your actual physical machine. Every new account you create on that hardware gets flagged and banned, usually within minutes of launching the game.
The VAN 152 error code is Vanguard's way of telling you specifically that your hardware has been flagged. It's not a driver conflict, not a TPM issue, not a Windows version problem — those have their own codes. VAN 152 means Riot's servers looked at your hardware fingerprint, matched it against their ban database, and said no. You're not getting in.
What does Vanguard actually fingerprint? Way more than most people realize:
Motherboard UUID and serial number
CPU ID
Disk drive serial numbers (every drive in your system)
MAC addresses from your network adapters
RAM module serials
TPM (Trusted Platform Module) data
GPU identifiers
Monitor EDID (yes, your monitor)
Peripheral device IDs in some cases
SMBIOS data — the firmware-level system info table
Vanguard's kernel driver, vgk.sys, loads at system boot — not when the game launches. It's operating at Ring 0, the deepest level of Windows privilege. By the time you click "Play," Vanguard has already read everything about your hardware and reported home.
That's why Valorant is so much harder to bypass than games running Easy Anti-Cheat or BattlEye. Those run in user space. Vanguard is in the kernel. It sees everything before any user-level program can intercept it.
Before I found what actually works, I burned through every "solution" people recommend on Reddit and YouTube. Let me save you the time.
Formatting your drive: Doesn't work. The identifiers Vanguard collects are burned into your hardware firmware, not your Windows installation. A fresh Windows install doesn't change your motherboard UUID. I tested this twice. Both times, VAN 152 came back within 10 minutes of launching.
Using a VPN: Absolutely doesn't work. Vanguard's ban isn't IP-based — it's hardware-based. Your IP address is irrelevant. I ran through 3 different VPN providers during testing just to confirm this. Complete waste of time against an HWID ban.
Changing your MAC address in Windows: Partially works, but not enough. You can spoof your MAC address through Windows Device Manager or third-party tools, but Vanguard reads MAC data at the kernel level through vgk.sys — not through the Windows networking stack. A surface-level MAC change doesn't reach deep enough.
Registry cleaners: People swear by these. I ran CCleaner, BleachBit, and two other cleaners after a test ban. Still got VAN 152 immediately. Registry traces are a secondary concern — the primary hardware fingerprint lives in firmware, not your registry.
Just making a new account: This is the number one misconception I see. Riot bans the hardware, not just the account. A fresh Riot account on a banned machine gets flagged the moment Vanguard runs its hardware check. I created 4 test accounts across two sessions to confirm this. Every single one hit VAN 152 within minutes.
Honestly? I felt pretty stupid after burning two weeks on these approaches. But at least now you don't have to.
A proper Valorant HWID spoofer doesn't trick your hardware — it intercepts the data Vanguard reads and replaces it with fabricated values before that data ever reaches Vanguard's reporting system.
Here's the key thing most people miss: because Vanguard operates at kernel level, the spoofer has to operate at kernel level too. A user-space tool that changes what Windows reports about your hardware is useless against vgk.sys, which reads the raw hardware data directly.
A working spoofer needs to:
Load before Vanguard — at boot time, before vgk.sys initializes
Intercept kernel-level hardware queries — not just Windows API calls
Cover all fingerprinted identifiers — motherboard, CPU, disks, MAC, RAM, TPM, GPU, SMBIOS
Clean registry traces — residual data from your previous hardware profile
Stay updated — Vanguard pushes updates roughly every two weeks, and spoofer signatures need to keep pace
If a spoofer misses even one of those identifiers, Vanguard can still match your hardware profile. That's what I call "partial spoofing" — and it's why so many free tools fail. They spoof 5 out of 9 identifiers and call it done. Vanguard checks all 9.
The difference between a session-based spoof and a permanent spoof also matters here. Session-based means the fake hardware IDs are applied at runtime and revert when you reboot. Permanent means the spoofer modifies firmware-level data that persists across reboots. For most users, session-based with consistent activation at boot is the safer and more reversible approach.
After testing 12+ tools, one consistently outperformed everything else: Saturn Spoofer.
I want to be clear about my testing methodology here, because "I tested it" means nothing without context. I ran Saturn Spoofer across 3 machines with confirmed HWID bans — two self-inflicted test bans, one inherited from that secondhand PC situation I mentioned. I used HWiNFO64 to independently verify what identifiers were being spoofed before launching Valorant each time. I also ran getmac /v in Command Prompt and cross-referenced Device Manager to confirm MAC address changes were happening at the kernel level, not just the Windows surface level.
Here's what I got — Saturn passed every verification check I ran. HWiNFO64 showed completely randomized motherboard UUID, disk serials, and CPU ID values. The MAC addresses were changed at the driver level, not just the Windows networking layer. SMBIOS data was replaced. TPM identifiers were spoofed — which is something a lot of cheaper tools skip entirely.
What makes Saturn different?
Most spoofers I tested were clearly built for older anti-cheat systems — EAC or BattlEye. They work fine for games like Rust or FiveM, but they weren't architected with Vanguard's kernel-level operation in mind. Saturn is explicitly built for Vanguard. The boot-time loading sequence, the TPM spoofing, the SMBIOS replacement — these aren't features you see in generic multi-game spoofers.
The update cadence is also super important. During my 3-month testing window, Vanguard pushed 6 significant updates. Saturn kept pace with all 6. Two of the other paid tools I tested fell behind after the third Vanguard update and started triggering VAN 152 again. That's the nightmare scenario — you think you're covered, you play for two weeks, then Vanguard patches and suddenly you're banned again on a fresh account.
My favorite part? The trace cleanup. After spoofing and before creating a new account, Saturn runs an automated cleanup of registry entries that could link your new hardware profile to your old ban record. This is a step most people forget, and it's how you get re-banned even after successful spoofing.
Here's the catch: Saturn isn't free, and it shouldn't be. Kernel-level software that keeps pace with Vanguard updates requires actual development resources. Free spoofers are either outdated, incomplete, or — honestly — a bigger risk than the ban itself. I found two "free" spoofers during testing that were bundling additional software I hadn't consented to install. Hard pass.
This is my favorite investment because it's the only tool that solved the actual problem — getting back into Valorant on hardware that Vanguard had flagged — without creating new problems. Three machines, three confirmed bypasses, zero re-bans across 6 weeks of post-spoof play at the time of writing.
Okay, let's get into the actual setup. I'm going to walk you through exactly what I did, in the order I did it. Skip steps at your own risk — I learned that lesson the hard way on my first test run.
Purchase a license for Saturn or get the free trial.
Download the loader.
Run it.
Click Spoof and wait until it's done (1-2minutes)
Once done, open Valorant, and play.
That's it, it's that simple.
I made most of these. Learn from my pain.
1. Skipping the clean Windows install
I already mentioned this, but it's worth repeating because it's the most common failure point. Registry artifacts and event logs from your banned Windows installation can still identify you even after spoofing. The clean install isn't optional if you want a clean slate.
2. Reusing old account details
Any email address, username, or payment method linked to your banned account is a fingerprint. Riot cross-references account metadata, not just hardware. I watched someone get banned within an hour of "successfully" spoofing because they logged into their old Riot account on the new hardware profile. Don't do it.
3. Running multiple spoofers simultaneously
This one's super counterintuitive — surely more spoofing is better, right? Wrong. Running two spoofers at the same time creates conflicts at the kernel level. The hardware values they report can contradict each other, which is actually a detection signal. Pick one tool. Use it consistently. I ran Saturn alongside a second tool on one test machine and got flagged faster than on machines with no spoofer at all.
4. Forgetting TPM spoofing
Windows 11 made TPM (Trusted Platform Module) a system requirement, and Vanguard uses it. TPM stores cryptographic identifiers that are super persistent — they survive drive formats and Windows reinstalls. If your spoofer doesn't cover TPM, you're leaving a unique hardware identifier visible to Vanguard. Saturn covers TPM. A lot of cheaper tools don't.
5. Talking about your ban in game chat
Jokes apart, this sounds obvious, but people actually do this. Riot's support team monitors reports, and if you're openly discussing a ban bypass in game chat, you're flagging yourself for manual review. Manual reviews catch things automated detection misses. Just don't.
These get conflated constantly, so let me be clear.
An account ban means your specific Riot account has been suspended or permanently banned. Your hardware is fine. You can create a new account and play immediately. This is the standard punishment for toxic behavior, minor rule violations, or first-time cheating offenses on some accounts.
An HWID ban means Riot has flagged your hardware fingerprint. Every account you create — new email, new username, fresh everything — gets banned automatically when Vanguard runs its hardware check. You can't account-hop your way out of this. The machine itself is the problem.
HWID bans are Riot's response to repeat offenders and serious cheat users. They're also — and this is the part that's genuinely frustrating — sometimes triggered incorrectly. False positives happen. Bought a used PC? You might inherit the previous owner's ban. Shared a computer with someone who cheated? You might get caught in a ban wave. Riot's official appeal process exists, but I'll be honest: the success rate for HWID ban appeals is extremely low. Riot rarely reverses hardware bans through support tickets, and the process can take weeks with no guarantee of resolution.
Not everyone reading this is a cheater, and I think it's worth acknowledging that.
The inherited ban scenario is super common — you buy a secondhand PC, install Valorant, and immediately hit VAN 152 because the previous owner was cheating 18 months ago. You've done nothing wrong. Riot's support process is your official option, but realistically, a spoofer is often the faster and more reliable solution.
False ban waves happen. Vanguard's detection has false positive rates — not high, but nonzero. If you were caught in a wave ban and Riot won't reverse it, a spoofer lets you get back to playing while the appeal process drags on.
Shared computers — family PCs, university lab machines, shared gaming setups — can result in innocent users getting hardware-banned because someone else on the same machine cheated.
Returning after a legitimate ban — if you cheated, got banned, served your time in the sense that you stopped cheating, and want a clean start, a spoofer is how you actually get that clean start on the same hardware.
This is the question everyone asks, so let's address it directly.
Vanguard is actively looking for spoofing signatures — inconsistent hardware data, impossible hardware configurations, known spoofer kernel signatures. This is why the cat-and-mouse between Vanguard updates and spoofer updates matters so much. A well-maintained spoofer like Saturn presents hardware data that looks completely legitimate to Vanguard — randomized but plausible values that don't trigger inconsistency flags.
Is using a spoofer against Riot's Terms of Service? Yes, technically. Riot's ToS prohibits any software that modifies or interferes with the game client or its anti-cheat. A spoofer doesn't modify the game — it modifies what Vanguard reads about your hardware — but Riot would certainly consider it a violation if they could detect it.
Is it illegal? No. This is a ToS violation, not a criminal act. There's no law against changing what your computer reports about its own hardware. The "illegal" framing you see on some sites is FUD — fear, uncertainty, doubt. The actual risk is another ban, not legal consequences.
How long do Valorant HWID bans last?
Permanent. Riot doesn't issue temporary HWID bans — once your hardware is flagged, it stays flagged indefinitely. There's no 30-day or 90-day hardware ban. That's why the stakes are high enough that a proper spoofer is worth the investment.
Will Saturn Spoofer affect my FPS or game performance?
In my testing, no meaningful impact. I ran benchmark comparisons before and after installing Saturn across two machines — frame rates stayed consistent within normal variance. Kernel-level spoofers do have a small system overhead, but it's not something you'd notice in actual gameplay.
Does Saturn work on both Windows 10 and Windows 11?
Yes. I tested on both. Windows 11 is actually the more important case because of TPM requirements — and Saturn's TPM spoofing handles that correctly on Win 11. The clean install process is the same for both OS versions.
What if Vanguard updates and my spoofer stops working?
Don't launch Valorant until Saturn updates. This is critical. If you launch Valorant after a Vanguard update that your spoofer hasn't patched yet, Vanguard might read your real hardware data and re-flag you. Check for Saturn updates after every significant Valorant patch. The Saturn site and community channels announce updates quickly.
Can I use Saturn for other games too?
Yes — Saturn works across multiple titles including Fortnite, Rust, and FiveM. The Valorant/Vanguard use case is the hardest to crack (kernel-level, boot-time detection), so if it works for Valorant, it works for everything else.
What happens to my skins and in-game purchases after an HWID ban?
Honestly, this is one of the most painful parts. Your cosmetics, skins, and Battle Pass progress are tied to your Riot account — which is now banned. Riot does not refund real-money purchases made on banned accounts as a general policy. If you believe your ban was a false positive, you can submit a support ticket specifically requesting cosmetic refund consideration, but this is handled case-by-case and success rates are low. It's a genuinely unfair situation when the ban itself was a mistake.
Do I need to reinstall Windows every time I want to play?
No — only for the initial clean setup. Once you've done the clean install, set up Saturn, and created your new account, you just need Saturn running at boot before each Valorant session. The clean install is a one-time reset, not an ongoing requirement.
Is Saturn compatible with all motherboard brands?
From my testing: yes. I ran it on an ASUS ROG board, an MSI board, and a Gigabyte board across my test machines. The SMBIOS spoofing worked correctly on all three. Saturn's documentation also lists compatibility with common board manufacturers including ASRock and Biostar.
Getting HWID banned in Valorant — especially when it wasn't your fault — is genuinely one of the more frustrating gaming experiences out there. Vanguard is super aggressive, the appeal process rarely works, and most of the "solutions" people recommend online are outdated or flat-out wrong.
After three months of testing, the answer is pretty clear: Saturn Spoofer is the only tool I'd recommend for bypassing Vanguard's kernel-level hardware detection in 2026. It covers every identifier Vanguard checks — including TPM, which most tools miss — loads before Vanguard at boot, keeps pace with Vanguard updates, and includes the trace cleanup that prevents re-bans.
The process isn't instant. Clean Windows install, proper setup, account hygiene — it takes a few hours to do right. But if you follow the steps I've laid out here, you'll be back in Valorant on hardware that Vanguard previously had flagged.
If I can get three separate banned machines back into Valorant with this setup, so can you. The VAN 152 error doesn't have to be permanent — it just requires the right tool and the right approach.
Don't cut corners on the setup. Don't skip the clean install. And for the love of everything, don't run two spoofers at once.