Effective ways to increase FPS and improve gaming performance

 

Nothing is worse than trying to play your favorite video games and struggling to get the FPS that allows you to play the game smoothly and enjoyably without jitters, lag, or stuttering.

 

Your computer is probably old and you are trying to keep it working until you can buy or assemble a new gaming PC.

 

And why not... You might also have a computer with leading tech specifications and a modern graphics card but - for some reason - delivers a lower frame rate than expected with games.

 

In any case, in this article, we will show you a set of practical and proven ways to increase the number of frames per second (FPS) when playing your favorite games whether you are using an old or new desktop/laptop.

Connecting the battery charger to the laptop

Many people use the laptop to play their favorite games from time to time in addition to their other work, but there is a fact that not plugging the battery charger into the laptop while playing games leads to a significant decrease in the frame rate,

 

This is somewhat logical. As the Windows operating system sets performance settings when the laptop is connected and not connected to the charger, when the charger is not connected, the performance of the device is reduced to ensure that you get the most out of the battery and make it last for longer periods.

When it is connected, the maximum achievable performance is consumed from the hardware components such as the processor, graphics card, RAM, hard disk, etc., it will work more efficiently because there is direct power and not only depends on the amount of power in the battery.

For this reason, you will get more frames when you connect the battery charger to the laptop while playing. Just give this method a try and you will feel a massive difference in performance.

Reduce game graphics settings

So, most video game lovers prefer to use desktop computers because of their powerful capabilities and provide a much better gaming experience than laptops. But if that's not the case for you and you're getting really low FPS in a game, one of the easiest and quickest solutions you can make is to simply go into the game's graphics settings and then lower the graphics level.

 

 You can either do this automatically, as some games have an option to lower the graphics to Medium or Low. Or manually by going to each setting in the list and setting it to a lower level than it is to turn all settings as low as possible. Things like Shadows, Texture, Anti-Aliasing, etc. greatly affect the processing speed of frames, and if they are turned off or reduced to match the capabilities of your graphics card, you can play the game smoothly but at the price of sacrificing quality.

But if you reduce the graphics settings as much as possible and the number of frames is still the same or with a small increase is not what you expected, then the next option is to lower the resolution of the game you are playing. Games consist of thousands of images that are displayed on the screen in quick succession.

Your device's graphics card's job is to process each of these images (frames) until the display receives them. The higher the display resolution, the more pixels in each image, and the higher the speed of the graphics card's processor to produce this image and this causes slowness sometimes. So when you lower the resolution in the game you are playing, you will reduce the number of pixels per frame which reduces the workload of the graphics card, which will allow it to produce frames at a higher rate. 

To do this, all you have to do is go to the game's graphics settings control screen, and there you will find a setting called Video Mode, Display Resolution, or Screen Scale, lower it. After that, click on the Apply button, and when the confirmation window appears, click on the Keep Changes button. This option will help you to increase the FPS effectively but also with the sacrifice of quality which will be poor and not bring out much detail in the game.

 

Graphics Card Driver Update

 

Maybe your problem isn't that your device is old and can't provide a higher frame rate, you lowered the graphics settings of the game and you still get fewer frames. In this case, you may need to check if the latest version of the graphics card driver is installed on your device, if not, you need to update it immediately as this can help improve gaming performance significantly, too. The task is very easy, just find the model of the graphics card used in your device (in case you do not know it already) and then go to the official website of the manufacturer and download the latest version of the driver available for Windows.

The method does not have to be difficult even if you are a novice computer user. Once you have updated the graphics card driver to the latest version, try to run the game again. No improvement yet? Well, we have more ways so continue to the next lines.

Overclocking your graphics card and CPU

As a last resort for some users who have an old graphics card, or a solution for any game that you just want to get higher frames while playing, one of the ways you can increase the frame rate is by overclocking your hardware resources. You can first start by overclocking the graphics card as it is an important part of gaming performance and we have already explained how to do this with MSI Afterburner.

Overclocking the graphics card: the correct steps to do this and raise the performance of games

Overclocking the processor, how and why we do it?

Although it is a simple task, at the same time it is a dangerous process and any mistake may damage the graphics card. Generally, doing this should result in more frames than usual in the game you are trying to play, which may help you put off upgrading to a new graphics card for longer. Also, you can overclock your processor and random access memory (RAM) as they are important parts that contribute to gaming performance.

Upgrade the device's internal gear

If none of the above methods work for you to increase the frame rate in games, it is possible that your computer is not able to perform acceptably for this game - mostly because it is new and therefore its capabilities do not meet the requirements to run the game at the lowest level.

 

If so, the best option is to buy a new graphics card or upgrade your computer as a whole in terms of the motherboard, processor, graphics card, RAM, and hard disk. And if you have a modern computer but do not have an external graphics card, you should buy one if you really want to enjoy a better gaming experience.

But if your hardware is old or you have a laptop that you can't upgrade components to, the best solution might be to buy a whole new computer. You can assemble it yourself according to your budget but keep in mind that the leading technical specifications you need to run the latest games are usually expensive.