Starfield: How to fix stuttering & low FPS issues on PC

❘ Published: 2024-02-25T20:21:07

Starfield scenery with high res and motion blur off

Bethesda

Starfield comes with rather demanding system requirements, leading to lots of players encountering optimization issues. If you’re trying to get smooth gameplay on a mid-range PC, here’s everything you need to do to fix stuttering and FPS issues in Starfield.

Starfield delivered a massive open world where players need to explore the universe while completing quests, building settlements, and colonizing procedurally generated planets.

Bethesda’s galactic adventure is one of the most graphically demanding titles up to date, and even with the recommended RTX 2080, players reported to have faced stuttering and other similar issues.

If you’re trying to improve Starfield‘s performance on your PC, here’s everything you can do, from disabling fullscreen optimizations to disabling GPU drivers.

Disabling Fullscreen Optimizations
Enabling hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling
Updating the GPU drivers
Tweaking graphics and disabling Motion Blur
Using a mod to fix Starfield’s performance

Disable Fullscreen Optimizations before playing Starfield

One of the solutions available to fix FPS drops and stuttering in Starfield is to disable Fullscreen Optimizations for the game. To do this, you need to exit the game and follow the next steps:

Go to the Starfield installation directory.
Right-click on Starfield.docx file.
Go to Properties.
Click on the Compatibility tab.
Tick “Disable fullscreen optimizations“.

After this, you should restart the game and see if the problem is fixed. If it wasn’t fixed on the go, try restarting your PC and then start the game once more.

Enable hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling before playing Starfield

The other solution to avoid stuttering and performance issues while playing Starfield is to enable Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling in System Settings. Here’s how to do that:

Go to System.
Tap Display settings.
Scroll down to the Graphics tab.
Click on change default graphics settings.
Toggle the Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling switch to on.
Save changes and restart your PC.

Once your PC restarts, you should be able to play the game normally without too many issues. If the problems persist, you should try the other solutions.

Tuning down Crowd Density in Starfield’s Graphics Menu may help with the FPS drops.

Update the GPU drivers before playing Starfield

Before playing Starfield, make sure your GPU drivers are up to date, because outdated drivers may be the cause of your FPS drops or stuttering. In order to do so, you should follow these steps:

For NVIDIA GPU users

Download/Install Nvidia GeForce Experience.
Run Nvidia GeForce Experience.
Go to the Drivers tab.
Click on “Check for updates“.
Choose the installation type (we recommend Clean).

For AMD GPU users

Enter Windows Control Panel.
Click on Device Manager.
Scroll to Display Adapters.
Find your AMD GPU tab.
Right-click on your GPU and then click Update Driver.

After the process is complete, try restarting the game. If the problem persists, then you might need to try other solutions, like tweaking the graphics.

Tweak Starfield Graphics and disable Motion Blur

To reduce stuttering and FPS drops in Starfield, you might need to tweak your graphics settings and disable Motion Blur and other settings. Here’s how to do it.

Start the game and press Esc, or in the Start Menu, go to Settings.
Scroll to Display.
Set Crowd Density to Medium.
Disable Motion Blur.
Disable Upscaling.
Turn on VSync.

Tuning down the settings in Starfield may be the solution for your stuttering problems.

By tuning down Crowd Density, when you enter cities and crowded spaces, your performance will improve considerably, and this doesn’t downgrade the graphic quality at all.

Motion Blur has always caused trouble, especially during game launches, so deactivating would be a good way to solve stuttering and FPS drops. Upscaling is not working properly right now, and some users have found that deactivating it increased the performance considerably.

Using a mod to fix Starfield’s performance

Before optimization mod (left) vs. After optimization mod (Right) in-game comparison on RTX 3060 Mobile GPU.

In the end, Bethesda is known for its massive support for the modding community. So you can use the Starfield Performance Optimization mod by E3roKK to severely increase the game’s performance on PC.

This mod will replace your in-game Ultra preset and use the modded preset file in its place. This should give you a fair boost in your performance as you will see somewhere around 5-15% improvement in your framerates.

To use this mod, simply paste the Ultra.ini file and “copy and replace” it into your main Starfield directory. Now launch your game and make your graphics preset “Ultra.” Now you are all set to experience a better performance in the game.

That’s all you need to know about how to fix Starfield stuttering and low FPS issues on PC. If you found this info useful, you can also check our other guides and tips below: