How to improve FPS in ARC Raiders (PC)
ARC Raiders is the PvPvE extraction shooter from Embark Studios, the team behind THE FINALS, and shares that game's obsession with real-time destruction. Built on Unreal Engine 5, it leans on fully destructible environments, dynamic global illumination via Lumen, and a ruined-world aesthetic that demands a lot from the GPU even on modest setups. The competitive nature of the game makes keeping a stable framerate during firefights just as important as clearly seeing enemies at medium and long range.
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Calculations based on our FPS model combined with the % gain of each setting (measured in public benchmarks).
1. Quick wins (no visual loss)
Start here. Each one adds a little, but together they give +54% free FPS.
Global Illumination (Lumen)
Lumen is the dynamic global illumination engine that gives ARC Raiders its ruined-world atmosphere, but it constantly recalculates light bounces.
Destruction Physics Quality
Cover destruction is the signature feature inherited from THE FINALS, but simulating fragment physics and collisions in real time costs both CPU and GPU alike.
Shadow Quality
Dynamic shadows in UE5 use Virtual Shadow Maps, precise but demanding when a lot of destructible geometry is casting shadows at once.
Effects Quality
Smoke, sparks, rubble dust, and weapon particles from the ARC generate a noticeable GPU load during firefights.
Motion Blur
Motion blur adds a rendering cost layer with no functional benefit in a shooter where spotting enemy movement is critical.
2. Medium impact settings
Here's where most of the FPS is. Minor visual impact, major performance impact.
Texture Quality
Textures barely impact performance when there's enough VRAM, and keeping them high helps distinguish camouflage detail and destroyed surfaces at a distance.
Anti-Aliasing (TSR/DLAA)
TSR is Unreal Engine 5's native temporal antialiasing and helps smooth the noise Lumen generates.
View Distance
Since this is an extraction game with open maps and medium-to-long-range engagements, reducing draw distance too much hurts your ability to spot rivals.
Post Process Quality
This category groups bloom, vignetting, and color correction that reinforce the ruined world's oppressive atmosphere.
Ambient Occlusion
Ambient occlusion reinforces contact shading between rubble and destroyed structures.
3. Upscaling (DLSS / FSR / XeSS)
The biggest gain in the game. Compatible with almost any modern GPU.
NVIDIA DLSS 3
+45% FPSDLSS 3 with Frame Generation is the best option on RTX 40-series GPUs and above, offering the biggest FPS gain with minimal sharpness loss.
AMD FSR 3
+35% FPSFSR 3 works on any modern GPU, including NVIDIA and Intel, and includes its own Frame Generation.
Intel XeSS
+30% FPSXeSS offers the best performance on Arc GPUs thanks to hardware acceleration, though it also works on NVIDIA and AMD.
4. Tips by GPU
NVIDIA
- •Enable Reflex to reduce input latency in PvP firefights, especially if you use DLSS 3 Frame Generation.
- •Always update to the latest Game Ready driver, since Lumen gets specific performance optimizations with every major UE5 release.
- •On cards with 8GB of VRAM or less, watch memory usage when combining High textures with Epic destruction simultaneously.
AMD
- •Enable Anti-Lag+ to offset the extra latency added by FSR 3 Frame Generation.
- •On RDNA 2 cards without dedicated RT units, prioritize lowering Lumen to Medium before any other setting.
- •Keep Adrenalin drivers updated, since Embark has published several RDNA-specific performance patches.
Sistema
- •Install the game on an NVMe SSD: streaming of rubble and destroyed textures generates constant load spikes.
- •Close background overlays and recording software, since destruction physics simulation is sensitive to available CPU cores.
- •Enable maximum performance mode in Windows and disable GPU power saving.
5. Known game issues
FPS drops when large structures collapse
When several destructible structures collapse at once, some players report momentary FPS drops while the engine calculates the resulting fragment physics.
Shader compilation stutter on first launch
As in most UE5 titles, the first session after installing or updating the game shows micro-stutters while shaders compile in the background.
High VRAM usage with high textures and Lumen simultaneously
On GPUs with 6-8GB of VRAM, combining High Texture Quality with High Lumen can saturate video memory.
Estado: Post-launch optimization patch (per community reports)
6. Frequently asked questions
What's the setting that gives the most FPS in ARC Raiders?▾
Is it worth enabling DLSS 3 or FSR 3 with Frame Generation in a competitive shooter?▾
Can I play ARC Raiders smoothly on an entry-level GPU?▾
Why does destruction look worse if I lower physics quality?▾
Want to know exactly how many FPS YOUR PC will get?
Enter your GPU and CPU in our calculator and measure the real impact of each setting.
Calculate FPS for ARC Raiders →Calculations based on consensus of technical sources and our own FPS model. More about our methodology →