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The reliable way to raise FPS without making a game look substantially worse is to find the bottleneck, keep the display output at its native resolution, use the game’s own upscaler, and reduce only the settings that are expensive in your scene. Change one variable at a time, compare the same demanding section, and judge both frame rate and image quality. No setting produces the same gain on every game or PC.
What “better FPS without worse graphics” actually means
Most performance menus affect different parts of the rendering workload. A setting that saves a large amount of GPU time in one game may barely move the frame rate in another, and a setting that looks expensive may not be responsible for your slowdown at all. The objective is therefore not to select a universal “best” preset. It is to remove the work your hardware cannot currently complete while preserving the details you notice most.
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There are two resolutions to keep separate:
- Output (display) resolution: the signal sent to the monitor or television, such as 1920×1080 or 2560×1440.
- Internal render resolution: the number of pixels the game draws before an upscaler reconstructs the image at the output resolution.
An in-game super-resolution option lowers internal rendering and reconstructs the result, so the display can remain at its native resolution. Lowering the output resolution without an upscaler is a more visible fallback because the display must stretch fewer pixels. Obsidian Entertainment’s support guidance describes the trade-off directly: “Fewer pixels drawn means less work for your graphics card, so dropping resolution can give FPS boosts with a small hit to image sharpness.”
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Measure the game while standing in, or repeatedly passing through, the scene where performance is worst. A quiet menu or an empty corridor can hide the workload that matters. Watch CPU and GPU utilization at the same time.
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When GPU utilization is high
A heavily loaded GPU is a reason to test GPU-costly options first. Use the game’s upscaler, then investigate shadows, reflections, global illumination, foliage, and ray tracing. Keep the output resolution unchanged while you test the upscaler so you can separate reconstruction quality from a lower-resolution display signal.
When CPU use is high and GPU use is low
Reducing texture quality or other GPU-only options may have little effect in a CPU-limited scene. Obsidian specifically suggests testing CPU-heavy ray-tracing work and crowd density in this situation. Which of those controls exists, and how much it costs, depends on the game.
A title-specific example is not a universal threshold
NVIDIA’s Control graphics guide documented a CPU bottleneck at about 80 FPS at 1920×1080 in its tested scenario. That number describes Control, its hardware, and its test conditions; it is not a general CPU limit for other games.
A repeatable tuning procedure
- Choose a repeatable test scene. Use the demanding area, encounter, or built-in benchmark that exposes the slowdown. Record the starting FPS and note visible problems such as softness, shimmering, or ghosting.
- Identify the busy component. Check whether the GPU is working heavily or whether CPU use is high while the GPU is relatively idle.
- Set the output to the monitor’s native resolution. This gives an in-game upscaler a stable target and avoids judging a stretched image as if it were a quality setting.
- Enable the game’s supported super-resolution method. Begin with its quality-oriented preset, then move toward a performance-oriented preset only if the measured result is still below your target.
- Test one expensive setting. Change a single option—such as shadows, reflections, global illumination, foliage, ray tracing, or crowd density—and replay the same scene.
- Inspect motion as well as a still image. Check fine detail, foliage edges, reflections, distant geometry, and moving objects. Temporal artifacts can appear only while the camera or characters move.
- Keep or undo the change. Retain a setting only when the frame-rate improvement is useful and the image-quality cost is acceptable. Restore the previous value when the result is worse.
- Stop when the goal is met. A stable cap at your chosen target is preferable to continuing to lower quality for frames you cannot see or use.
Use the built-in upscaler first
Obsidian’s performance guidance recommends trying the game’s own supported upscaling before reducing the output resolution. In this mode, the game knows its motion vectors, depth information, anti-aliasing pipeline, and reconstruction settings, which can make the result more coherent than a generic driver filter.
How to choose the preset
Start with a quality-oriented option. If the demanding scene remains below your target, move one step toward performance and repeat the same test. Look at small text, thin geometry, foliage, hair, specular highlights, and moving edges. A higher FPS number is not an improvement if the chosen preset introduces distracting blur or temporal artifacts in the parts of the image you actually watch.
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There is no source-supported universal ranking of upscalers. Compare each option on the factors that affect your game:
| Comparison factor | What to check |
|---|---|
| Compatibility | Whether the game exposes the method and whether your GPU supports it. |
| Output and preset | The output resolution and the quality or performance mode selected. |
| Image quality | Sharpness, fine detail, and temporal artifacts during camera and character motion. |
| Measured performance | FPS in your own demanding scene rather than a claim from another title. |
| Responsiveness | Any latency or control-feel trade-off introduced by optional frame generation. |
Intel XeSS preset guidance
Intel’s XeSS Super Resolution Developer Guide 2.0 labels modes from Native Anti-Aliasing and Ultra Quality through Balanced, Performance, and Ultra Performance. The guide’s preset table recommends Performance for 1440p and above and also lists Ultra Performance for 1440p and above. Its resolution-based default guidance recommends Balanced at 1080p and lower, and Performance at 1440p and higher. These are developer recommendations for a game’s menu implementation, not guaranteed results for every player.
| XeSS mode named in the guide | Intent or guidance described by Intel |
|---|---|
| Native Anti-Aliasing | Native-resolution anti-aliasing mode. |
| Ultra Quality | Quality-oriented reconstruction mode. |
| Balanced | Resolution-specific default guidance for 1080p and lower. |
| Performance | Resolution-specific default guidance for 1440p and higher; also listed for 1440p and above in the preset table. |
| Ultra Performance | A more performance-oriented option listed for 1440p and above in the preset table. |
Frame generation is a separate decision
Frame generation creates additional displayed frames; it is not the same as rendering more native frames. It can have a different effect on latency and responsiveness, so assess control feel separately from the displayed FPS counter. The available evidence does not support a universal frame-generation recommendation. If you enable it, test it in the game and hardware combination you actually use.
Adjust expensive settings selectively
Do not move every slider to Low. Selective reductions preserve the visual features you value while targeting the workload identified by your diagnosis.
Shadows
Shadow quality can affect the number, resolution, and filtering of shadow maps. Test one step at a time and examine contact shadows, nearby character shadows, and distant structures. If the improvement is negligible, restore the original value and test another control.
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Reflections
Reflections can be particularly costly in scenes with water, glass, polished floors, or many dynamic objects. Compare a busy reflective area rather than a dry outdoor scene, because the cost is scene-dependent.
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Global-illumination quality changes how indirect light is calculated. Lowering it may affect interior lighting, bounce light, and shaded corners more than an outdoor scene. Judge the result in the locations where the game spends the most time.
Foliage and view detail
Dense vegetation and distant detail can increase both rendering and scene-management work. If the GPU is the limiting component, foliage is a logical controlled test. If the CPU is limiting performance, a separate crowd or simulation setting may matter more than foliage.
Ray tracing
Test ray tracing both on and off rather than assuming its label predicts the result. Its cost varies with the scene, the hardware, and the implementation. Obsidian’s guidance cautions that ray tracing can sometimes improve performance in some areas, so the result must be measured instead of presumed.
When a driver-level upscaler makes sense
A driver-level spatial upscaler can help when a title does not provide an integrated option. AMD Radeon Super Resolution (RSR) is intended for compatible systems and games through AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition. AMD’s support article, last updated June 25, 2025, explains the compatibility requirements and uses Adrenalin 25.6.1 with an RX 9070 as an example setup. That example is version- and hardware-specific; check the current support requirements for your own system.
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When a game supports AMD’s in-game FidelityFX Super Resolution, AMD recommends using the integrated FSR option instead of RSR because game-specific optimizations can produce a better result. RSR is therefore a fallback, not a reason to ignore a title’s native implementation. Compare the same output resolution, preset, motion artifacts, and measured FPS when deciding between available methods.
Use output-resolution reduction only as a fallback
If the game has no usable upscaler, lowering the output resolution can reduce the number of pixels the GPU draws. The image will be softer because the display is scaling a smaller signal. Try the smallest reduction that reaches your target, and restore native output when another setting or an integrated upscaler can provide the required performance.
If an in-game upscaler is active, keep the output at native resolution and adjust its quality preset instead. Otherwise, you are changing two variables at once and cannot tell whether the FPS gain came from reconstruction or from sending a lower-resolution signal to the display.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Set a frame-rate cap for the goal you actually have
A frame-rate cap is useful when the system can render substantially more frames than the display or game target requires. AMD notes that, in supported cases, its frame-rate targeting feature can reduce power use, heat, and fan noise. A cap does not create performance: if the machine cannot reach the cap in the demanding scene, raising or lowering the cap will not make the game render faster.
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Leave broad driver changes until after in-game tuning
AMD states that its default driver settings offer most users the best balance of visual quality and performance, measured in FPS. That makes the game’s own controls the safer first place to tune. Driver overrides can alter anti-aliasing behavior or other rendering paths without exposing the same per-title context as an integrated option. Change them only for a specific compatibility or performance reason, and record the original value so you can undo the experiment.
How to compare quality and performance fairly
Use a simple record for each change:
- The game, patch, output resolution, and graphics preset.
- The exact setting changed and its old and new values.
- The scene or benchmark used.
- The observed FPS before and after the change.
- Visible effects in still images and during motion.
- Whether controls feel more or less responsive.
Replay the same route or benchmark after every individual change. If the scene, camera path, or combat intensity changes, the FPS comparison is no longer clean. When a result is worse, restore the previous value rather than stacking more changes on top of it.
Practical decision paths
GPU-bound at native 1440p
- Keep 1440p as the output resolution.
- Enable the integrated super-resolution option at its quality preset.
- Move to a more performance-oriented preset only after checking fine detail and motion artifacts.
- If more headroom is needed, test shadows, reflections, global illumination, foliage, and ray tracing individually.
- Cap the frame rate only after confirming the system can sustain the chosen target.
CPU-bound with a lightly loaded GPU
- Do not expect texture, shadow, or other GPU-only reductions to solve the limit.
- Test CPU-heavy ray-tracing work and crowd density where the game exposes those controls.
- Repeat the same scene comparison after each change.
- Use an upscaler only if GPU work is also contributing; reducing internal resolution cannot remove a CPU bottleneck by itself.
No integrated upscaler available
- Check whether a compatible driver-level option such as RSR is available for the game and GPU.
- Prefer an integrated FSR implementation when the title provides one, as AMD recommends.
- If neither route is suitable, lower output resolution by the smallest amount that meets the target and inspect sharpness.
Common mistakes that waste image quality
- Changing everything at once: you cannot identify which setting helped or which one caused the visible damage.
- Using a lower display resolution before trying reconstruction: this gives up sharpness that an in-game upscaler may preserve.
- Assuming ray tracing is always the largest cost: its effect varies by scene and implementation.
- Ignoring CPU limits: a low GPU workload with high CPU use points toward a different set of controls.
- Judging only a screenshot: temporal artifacts and shimmering may appear only during motion.
- Treating a vendor result as a promise: benchmark figures belong to the named game, hardware, resolution, and settings.
- Using a frame cap to solve an unreachable target: a cap limits excess frames; it cannot raise a system’s maximum performance.
What the published performance figures do—and do not—prove
NVIDIA’s Control guide reports DLSS frame-rate increases of “as much as 89%” in a higher-fidelity mode and “up to 197%” in lower-resolution performance modes under the guide’s heavy-GPU-load conditions. Those are vendor-reported results for Control, not typical or guaranteed gains. Your result depends on the game, GPU, output resolution, preset, scene, and whether the system is GPU- or CPU-limited.
For the same reason, a single FPS target should not dictate a graphics preset for every PC. The useful conclusion is methodological: match the change to the bottleneck, preserve native output when reconstruction is available, and verify the outcome in the workload you actually play.
When an upgrade is justified
Consider new hardware only after the tuning process shows a persistent bottleneck that settings cannot reasonably address. A GPU upgrade makes sense only when the GPU is consistently the limiting component and the choice fits your budget, target resolution, games, and existing system. A CPU, memory, cooling, or platform decision requires the corresponding diagnosis instead. There is no single product that improves FPS equally for all readers, so an upgrade should follow evidence from your own games rather than a generic shopping list.
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