Elden Ring, the spiritual successor to the Dark Souls franchise remains among the most popular PC games in 2024. The release of its latest expansion pack “Shadow of the Erdtree” will only strengthen its position as the most popular RPG on Steam. At the time of writing, the game has over 200K concurrent players with a 24-hour peak of 254K. Below, you’ll find a detailed breakdown of all the graphics settings available in Elden Ring and their performance metrics.
Windows/System Settings to Optimize
Enable Resizable BAR (SAM)
Resizable BAR was enabled on most x86 motherboards and GPUs following the adoption of the PCIe Gen 4 standard. Traditionally, the CPU and GPU have communicated through a narrow BAR (a 256 MB window), constantly moved around to allow the CPU to access different parts of the graphics memory. Resizable BAR allows the CPU full access to the GPU’s memory bus rather than a small portion.
Intel’s 10th Gen CPUs and newer support Resize BAR, while AMD’s Ryzen 3000 chips and onward also support it. On the GPU side, NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 30 series and newer feature Resizable BAR support. The Radeon RX 6000 cards were the first to enable it on the opposite side.
Enabling Resizable BAR usually involves turning on two PCIe technologies from the motherboard BIOS: Above 4G Decoding, and Resizable BAR support. The ASUS, Gigabyte, and MSI motherboard guides are linked for further instructions.
Hardware Accelerated GPU Scheduling and Windowed Optimizations
Turn on “Optimizations for windowed games” in your Windows settings as this will help with latency and thread priorities. To get there, open System Settings (Right-click on the Windows logo and click settings) -> Display -> Graphics -> Default graphics settings and enable both options.
Xbox Game Bar and Game Mode
- Go to Windows settings->Gaming tab-> Game Mode. Ensure Game Mode is enabled.
- The Windows power plan is best set to “High Performance” or equivalent. Furthermore, if you’re playing on a laptop, keep it plugged in unless that’s not an option.
- Finally, open the NVIDIA or AMD companion app and ensure the latest graphics drivers are installed.
Overclock your Graphics Card
Overclocking GPUs is a fairly safe and easy process. If done right, it won’t void your warranty and can boost your gaming performance by at least 5-10%. Unlike CPUs, you don’t have to mess with the BIOS or worry about BSODs. All you need is MSI Afterburner or EVGA Precision X (they work with GeForce and Radeon cards regardless of the AIB):
- MSI Afterburner.
- GPU-Z
- Games you play often, preferably a recent release that will stress the GPU.
- Here’s a guide to get you started.
Enable XMP/EXPO Memory Profile
XMP profiles (EXPO for AMD Ryzen platforms) are a set of predetermined memory clocks and timings known to run stably on a given memory die. They’re 1-click memory overclocks that save you the trauma of testing every frequency and timing.
Most motherboard BIOSes include this setting on the BIOS homepage, under one of the following: Extreme Memory Profile, AI Overclock Tuner, Load XMP Profile, EXPO, A-XMP, or DRAM Profile. Further instructions are linked.
Elden Ring System Requirements
Elden Ring has modest system requirements, with a GTX 1070 8 GB or an RX Vega 56 8 GB recommended for 1080p “High.” A hex-core Intel i7-8700K or an AMD Ryzen 5 3600X should be sufficient in most cases, backed by 16 GB of main memory, and 80 GB of storage.
Accordingly, 1440p “Maximum” will require a GeForce RTX 2080/RTX 3070, while 4K is best tackled with an RTX 4070 Ti/4070 Ti Super. Any 12th or 13th Gen Core i5 or a Ryzen 5 7600X should fulfill the CPU requirements at these settings.
Test Bench
- CPU: Intel Core i9-13900K.
- Motherboard: ASUS ROG Maximus Z790 Hero.
- Cooler: Lian Li Galahad 360.
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090.
- Memory: 16GB x2 DDR5-6000 CL30.
- Power Supply: Corsair RM1000e.
Unlocking the 60 FPS Framerate Limit
Elden Ring features a 60 FPS framerate limit on PC, regardless of your monitor’s refresh rates. This can be unlocked using the “Elden Ring FPS Unlocker and More.” You can download the tool from this GitHub link.
- Before you run the tool, you need to enforce “V-Sync Off” from the NVIDIA control panel.
- In the NVIDIA control panel, open “Manage 3D Settings” and select Elden Ring from the drop-down list.
- Scroll to the bottom of the game profile, and set “V-Sync” to off.
- Run the FPS Unlocker to set your desired frame rate limit, and launch the game using the included button.
- The game will disable online mode whenever you’re running this tool, but everything else will run as intended without any glitching or artifacts.
Elden Ring: Resolution Scaling & Graphics Presets
Elden Ring averaged 133 FPS at 4K “maximum” settings on our GeForce RTX 4090/Core i9-13900K rig, with lows of 100.6 FPS. The 1080p and 1440p averages aren’t much higher, both falling short of 140 FPS with 1% lows of 112 FPS. There’s a clear CPU bottleneck at lower resolutions which we’ll look at closer to the end.
There is a mere 16% performance difference between the maximum and low graphics settings, with an average delta of 5-10% between two consecutive presets. Luckily, the RTX 4090 manages over 130 FPS at maximum settings, climbing up to 154 FPS at the lowest.
Elden Ring Ray Tracing Performance
Elden Ring features ray tracing, improving rasterized ambient occlusion and shadows. Unfortunately, the impact on visual fidelity is subtle, unlike the performance. The game is 40% slower with ray tracing set to maximum, versus traditional rasterization. The medium, low, and high-quality presets perform roughly the same, producing 32-35% lower framerates than “Off”.
Ray tracing has a varying degree of impact on performance, varying from 40% at 4K to 14% at 1440p, and 10% at 1080p. More pixels mean more rays, and therefore a higher frametime penalty.
Antialiasing and Ambient Occlusion (SSAO)
Elden Ring leverages temporal anti-aliasing to improve the quality of thin objects and smoothen edges. It has an unnoticeable impact on performance, chipping off barely one or two FPS off the average.
Screen space ambient occlusion (SSAO) is used for darkening corners, crevices, and isolated surfaces, thereby adding depth to the scene. Like anti-aliasing, it has a negligible impact on framerates, reducing the average FPS by 1-2 FPS at 4K.
Volumetrics and Reflection Quality
Volumetrics adjusts the quality of volumetric lighting rays and/or fog in areas obscured from the sun. Going from maximum to low grants a 4-5% performance uplift, though it may be higher in more foggy regions.
Reflections significantly impact performance, but since there aren’t many shiny or reflecting objects in Elden Ring, we see a minimal FPS dip of less than 4% going from maximum to low.
Grass and Effects Quality
Grass quality sets the render distance (from the player) at which grass is rendered in the game world. Lower settings mean frequent pop-ins and barren lands in the distance. It doesn’t significantly impact performance in Elden Ring. Our framerates increased from 136.4 FPS to 140.4 FPS or 3% upon switching from maximum to medium.
Effects adjust the quality of special effects like smoke, embers, fire, etc. Like grass, it subtly impacts performance, reducing framerates by 3% at maximum quality (versus low).
Shader and Lighting Quality
Shader quality sets the fidelity of in-game shaders, affecting how different textures and objects react to light. This setting has an insignificant impact on performance, costing a mere frame or two at 4K. Water surface quality adjusts water detail and similarly impacts framerates.
Lighting quality adjusts the fidelity of direct and pre-baked lighting. Like most other settings, it has a nominal (2-3%) effect on performance.
Shadows and Global Illumination Quality
Shadow quality sets the resolution of shadow maps which adjusts the detail of in-game shadows. It doesn’t much affect the FPS, with the maximum being 2 FPS slower than the lowest.
Global illumination calculates the indirect or diffuse lighting. It doesn’t impact performance, reducing the 1% lows by a paltry ~2 FPS.
Elden Ring VRAM Usage
Elden Ring goes easy on graphics memory, using less than 8 GB of VRAM at 4K “Maximum” with ray-tracing enabled and set to “Maximum.” QHD or 1440p uses slightly over 5 GB, while 1080p requires less than 5 GB of VRAM at the same settings.
At 4K, the lowest quality preset uses 5.76 GB VRAM, while “medium” and “high” utilize up to 6.5 GB. The highest quality settings take up to 7.5 GB.
Elden Ring CPU Bottleneck
Elden Ring can be surprisingly CPU-bound at 1080p “maximum” settings. We observed a GPU-busy deviation of 40% at this resolution.
The CPU bottleneck persists at 1440p with a GPU-busy deviation of 29%. Enabling ray-tracing or setting the resolution to 4K shifts the load to the GPU, almost (completely) eliminating the CPU bottleneck.
Optimized Settings for Elden Ring in 2024: Low-end and High-end PCs
| Optimized Settings | High-end PC | Mid-Range PC | Low-end PC |
|---|---|---|---|
| Resolution | 4K (3840 × 2160) | 1440p (2560 x 1440) | 1080p (1920 x 1080) |
| Target FPS | 60 FPS+ | 60 FPS+ | 60 FPS+ |
| Motion Blur | Up to you | Up to you | Up to you |
| Depth of Field | Up to you | Up to you | Up to you |
| Texture Quality | Maximum | Maximum | Maximum |
| Shadow Quality | Maximum | Maximum | High |
| Volumetrics Quality | Maximum | Maximum | High |
| Reflection Quality | Maximum | Maximum | High |
| Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO) | Maximum | Maximum | Maximum |
| Global Illumination | High | High | High |
| Lighting Quality | Maximum | Maximum | High |
| Shader Quality | High | High | High |
| Water Surface Quality | High | High | High |
| Grass Quality | Maximum | Maximum | High |
| Effects Quality | Maximum | Maximum | High |
| Ray Tracing Quality (Off on AMD Radeon GPUs) | High/Maximum | Medium/High | Medium/High |
| Anti-aliasing | High | High | High |
| High-end (4K) | Mid-range (1440p) | Low-end (1080p) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| CPU | Core i7-13700K/Ryzen 7 7800X3D | Core i5-13600K/Ryzen 5 7600X | Less than: Core i5-12400/Ryzen 5 3600 |
| GPU | RTX 4070 Ti Super/RX 7900 XT | RTX 4070/RX 7800 XT | Less than: RTX 4060/RX 7600 |
| Memory | 32GB (dual-channel) | 16GB (dual-channel) | Less than: 16GB (dual-channel) |
Elden Ring Optimized Settings for Low-End PC
Here’s our optimization guide for low-end PCs. More details here.
| For Low-end PC | RTX 3060/RX 6600 (R5 5600) | RTX 3060 Ti (R5 5600) | RTX 4060 (R5 5600) | RTX 3060 Laptop GPU | RTX 4060 Laptop GPU |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Resolution | 1080p | 1080p/1440p | 1080p/1440p | 1080p | 1080p/1440p |
| Target FPS | 60 FPS | 60 FPS | 60 FPS | 60 FPS | 60 FPS |
| Motion Blur | Up to you | Up to you | Up to you | Up to you | Up to you |
| Depth of Field | Up to you | Up to you | Up to you | Up to you | Up to you |
| Texture Quality | Maximum | Maximum | Maximum | Maximum | Maximum |
| Shadow Quality | Maximum | Maximum | Maximum | Maximum | Maximum |
| Volumetrics Quality | Maximum | Maximum/High | Maximum/High | Maximum | Maximum |
| Reflection Quality | Maximum | Maximum/High | Maximum/High | Maximum | Maximum |
| Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO) | Maximum | Maximum/Medium | Maximum/Medium | Maximum | Maximum |
| Global Illunmination | High | High | High | High | High |
| Lighting Quality | Maximum | Maximum/High | Maximum/High | Maximum | Maximum |
| Shader Quality | High | High/Medium | High/Medium | High | High |
| Water Surface Quality | High | High | High | High | High |
| Grass Quality | Maximum | Maximum/Medium | Maximum/Medium | Maximum | Maximum |
| Effects Quality | Maximum | Maximum/High | Maximum/High | Maximum | Maximum |
| Ray Tracing Quality | Off | High/Off | High/Off | Off | High/Off |
| Anti-aliasing | High | High | High | High | High |
Elden Ring: Best Steam Deck Graphics Settings
Here’s a detailed look at the performance, quality, and battery life of Elden Ring on the Steam Deck.
| Optimized Graphics Settings | Steam Deck OLED |
|---|---|
| Resolution | 800p (1280 x 800) |
| Lighting Quality | Low |
| Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO) | Off (Low for 35-40 FPS) |
| Texture Quality | High |
| Antialiasing | Low |
| Motion Blur | Off |
| Depth of Field | Off |
| Grass Quality | Medium |
| Global Illumination Quality | Low |
| Shadow Quality | Low |
| Water Surface Quality | Low |
| Reflection Quality | Low |
| Shader Quality | Low |
| Volumetric Quality | Low |
| Effects Quality | Low |
| Ray Tracing Quality | Off |
