How to improve your FPS for better gaming (without buying new hardware)
You don't need a new GPU to increase your frame rates, but you'll need to turn off some fancy graphical enhancements.
Generally, PC gamers care more about frame rates than their console-playing counterparts. And they should: as a platform, PC offers far greater levels of customization than consoles, letting you tweak all manner of graphical presets, output resolutions and advanced rendering techniques like ray tracing. But what if you're a PC player who doesn't want to buy new hardware to boost frames rates in your favorite games?
The fiscally sensible don't need to obliterate their bank balances on a new GPU or upgraded RAM to experience a smooth 60 or even 120 fps. Below, we'll guide you through simple settings tweaks to boost performance, while also telling you what graphical features to avoid if you're on a modest rig thirsting for smooth frame rates.
Don't forget the basics first: close background apps so they aren't fighting for resources your game can use, and clean out your gaming rig if it's been a while. Excess dust in your case means the system has to work harder to cool it, rather than putting that juice toward performance.
Lower graphics settings and tweak power options
First, jump into in-game menus and start lowering graphical settings. Texture quality, shadows and effects like ambient occlusion can all create a strain on your GPU if you've set these sliders too high, so it's worth reducing them to medium or low if you're struggling to lock down a stable frame rate. Also consider disabling features like motion blur and in-game V-sync to reduce input lag, then cap your frame rate through control panels to prevent screen tearing.
The difference between high and low settings in many games isn't always huge, especially during fast-paced action. Unless you're obsessed with graphical fidelity, settling on a less demanding preset is wise if you're craving a locked 60 fps, since there's an inverse relationship between graphics quality and performance. A lot of modern titles auto-detect optimized settings the first time you boot up a game by calculating what hardware you're using.
There are less obvious ways to boost frame rate performance that don't involve dipping into graphics menus. Though the results won't be as significant as dropping your internal resolution, turning off recording software can help. Regularly download the latest GPU drivers, and roll back the driver if an update breaks your game.
You should also make sure your operating system is optimized to run games as well as it can. Set your power mode to prioritize best performance, and enable game mode if available to de-prioritize other background processes while you're playing a game.
Use supersampling to boost frame rates
Supersampling has become a crutch many modern AAA games can't do without. With blockbuster titles, your best bet for boosting fps numbers is to lean on an upscaler. NVIDIA DLSS, AMD FSR, and Intel XeSS are robust supersampling solutions that produce results often looking as good as native resolution while being far more performant.
Supersampling uses AI and deep learning techniques to take low internal resolutions and upscale them to a far higher output. This means your GPU has to natively render far fewer pixels, with AI handling the reconstruction work, leading to higher frame rates.
For modern cards, frame generation can also amp up your fps at a cost. While multi-frame generation tech can drastically increase frame rates, input lag can increase significantly when the technology is enabled. Forcing your GPU to buffer interpolated, AI-assisted frames often adds a dramatic amount of latency, but can offer a smoother-looking experience.
Turn off ray tracing
Ray tracing is an absolute performance killer. Compared to old-school rasterization methods, this advanced rendering technique can hobble frame rates. Even the most powerful graphics cards can drop a whole lot of frames when ray tracing features are cranked to the max. If you're playing on a mid-range or aging graphics card and want to claw back performance, ray tracing is the first graphical setting you should turn off.
Unlike pre-calculated rasterized effects, ray tracing realistically simulates lighting, shadows and reflections in real-time by bouncing rays around the in-game environment. This effect can be particularly immersive, but comes with a massive hardware cost.
The trouble is, ray tracing can often cut your fps in half or more, even on capable GPUs. If you're not comfortable with a 50 percent performance drop, it's best to turn ray tracing off, especially if you don't own a cutting-edge GPU.
Path tracing is even more demanding. Unless you own top-tier hardware, you should avoid this feature. Though it looks utterly gorgeous, path tracing can kneecap even the most expensive cards if you disable upscaling and frame generation.
