Which graphics settings cost the most FPS, and what to lower first

The graphics menu of a modern game can have thirty options, and the names are not always clear. The good news is that a handful of settings account for most of the performance cost, while others are almost free. Knowing the difference lets you gain FPS without making the game look worse than it needs to.

The exact numbers change from game to game, so use this as a guide, then check the result in your own game.

The expensive settings

These usually have the biggest effect on frame rate:

• Ray tracing. Realistic reflections, shadows and lighting cost a lot, even on powerful graphics cards. Turning it off, or to a low level, is often the single biggest gain.
• Shadow quality. High shadow resolution and long shadow distances are heavy. Going from ultra to high often gives a large gain with little visible change.
• Volumetric effects. Fog, clouds and light shafts are demanding. A lower setting usually looks almost the same.
• Ambient occlusion. Adds soft shading in corners and between objects. The most advanced types cost the most.
• Resolution and render scale. The most powerful lever of all. Lowering it reduces the load on the graphics card directly.
• Reflections and screen space effects. Mirrors and shiny surfaces can be heavy in some games.

The settings that cost little

You can usually keep these high:

• Texture quality. Mostly depends on how much video memory you have. If you have enough, high textures cost almost no speed and improve the picture a lot.
• Texture filtering. Anisotropic filtering at 8x or 16x is cheap on modern cards and makes surfaces look sharper at an angle.
• Model and object detail. Moderate cost, and often hardly visible at normal distances.

Settings that depend on your hardware

• View distance. Mostly costs processor time. If your processor is the limit, a lower value helps.
• Anti-aliasing. Heavy methods such as multi-sample anti-aliasing are costly. Temporal methods and upscaler-based options are cheaper.
• Crowd and population density. Affects the processor in open world games.

A safe order for lowering settings

1. Turn off or lower ray tracing.
2. Use an upscaler such as DLSS, FSR or XeSS. See our guide on how upscaling works.
3. Lower shadows by one step, then another.
4. Lower volumetric effects and ambient occlusion.
5. Lower reflections and other screen effects.
6. If it still runs poorly, lower the resolution or render scale.
7. Keep textures as high as your video memory allows.

Change one thing at a time and look at the result. If a setting makes no visible difference to you but gives 8 percent more FPS, keep it low.

How to compare quickly

Pick a scene that is demanding and easy to repeat, for example a busy city street. Note the FPS, change one setting, and compare. Many games have a benchmark mode that does this for you.

Special cases

• Competitive shooters. Many players lower shadows and effects to get a higher, steadier frame rate and a clearer image, even on strong hardware.
• Story games. Here it often makes more sense to keep the picture quality high and aim for a stable 60 FPS.
• Handhelds and laptops. Lower settings also reduce heat and extend battery life.

Check video memory

If you set textures higher than your graphics card can hold, the game will stutter. Many menus show a memory bar. Keep it below the limit. If it is full, lower texture quality first.

For the full process, see how to raise FPS in any PC game.