How to improve FPS in Deep Rock Galactic (PC)
Deep Rock Galactic runs on Unreal Engine 4, but with a voxelized, destructible terrain engine custom-built by Ghost Ship Games, which makes it much more CPU-demanding than its "low poly" look suggests. Every cave is generated and destroyed in real time, so performance depends both on how many dwarves, bugs, and dynamic lighting are on screen and on how much terrain has been dug out. It's a game that scales reasonably well on modest GPUs, but suffers frametime spikes during big waves (swarms, Mactera, Molly events) and massive excavations like "gold rush" runs. This guide covers the settings that actually move the FPS needle without wrecking cave readability, plus the truth about (limited) upscaling support.
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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 +40% free FPS.
Shadow Quality
Caves use lots of dynamic light sources (flashlights, gunfire, flares, bioluminescent creatures) and shadows on Ultra are among the most expensive things in the engine. Dropping to Medium reduces dynamic shadow resolution without losing the readability of the cave's geometry.
Volumetric Lighting / Fog
The volumetric light shafts cutting through cave dust (very visible in Crystalline Caverns and Fungus Bogs) are expensive to render. Dropping to Low keeps the general atmosphere while removing much of the per-pixel cost.
Particle Effects
Rock destruction generates clouds of debris particles; in big waves or when using the Driller's C4, the number of simultaneous particles can spike frametime. Medium reduces particle density while keeping the excavation's visual feedback.
Vegetation Distance
In biomes with dense vegetation like Fungus Bogs and Dense Biozone, reducing the render distance of mushrooms and plants eases geometry load without affecting close-quarters combat, which is where visibility actually matters.
Motion Blur
Adds little to the gameplay of a fast cooperative shooter and can cause visual discomfort in close combat against swarms; disabling it gives the GPU a small break and improves clarity in combat.
2. Medium impact settings
Here's where most of the FPS is. Minor visual impact, major performance impact.
Texture Resolution
DRG doesn't have excessively heavy textures, but on cards with less than 6GB of VRAM, dropping from Ultra to High avoids micro-stutters from texture streaming when entering new caves.
Post Processing
Groups effects like bloom, vignette, and color grading. Dropping to Medium smooths the per-frame cost in scenes with lots of light (flares, the Gunner's laser cutter) without leaving the image flat.
View Distance
Since most of the game takes place in closed caves, view distance rarely matters except in open caverns like Salt Pits or Crystalline Caverns; reducing it saves background geometry rendering.
Ambient Occlusion
AO helps give depth to the voxelized caves, so lowering it (instead of disabling it) is a good middle ground between performance and the sense of volume in the rock.
Real-Time Reflections
Mostly applies to puddles, lava, and mineral surfaces; on Low they still give the visual cue of wet terrain or Morkite without the cost of high-resolution reflections.
3. Upscaling (DLSS / FSR / XeSS)
The biggest gain in the game. Compatible with almost any modern GPU.
No official support (DLSS/FSR/XeSS)
+0% FPSDeep Rock Galactic does NOT support DLSS, FSR, or XeSS natively: it's a 2018 game (1.0 in 2020) on UE4 with no upscaling implementation added by Ghost Ship Games. Any third-party mod or injector promising this isn't officially supported and can cause artifacts or issues with anti-cheat in online matches.
Resolution Scale
+15% FPSThe real alternative is the game's own "Resolution Scale" (or "Screen Percentage") slider: dropping it to 85-90% reduces internal render load while keeping the output resolution and interface sharpness, making it the most honest way to recover FPS on limited GPUs.
4. Tips by GPU
NVIDIA
- •Enable Reflex from the NVIDIA panel (Low Latency Mode: On) to reduce input lag in close combat against swarms, since the game doesn't integrate it natively.
- •Use DSR/DLDSR only if your GPU has performance to spare at 1080p: with no native upscaling, it's the only "official" way to improve sharpness without relying on mods.
- •Keep Shader Cache set to "Unlimited" in the control panel: DRG recompiles shaders when changing biomes, and this reduces micro-stutters from the second match onward.
AMD
- •Enable Radeon Anti-Lag to compensate for the game's lack of native latency management, especially noticeable in the Gunner's shield close-combat.
- •Check that Radeon Chill is disabled during intense excavations: it can needlessly limit FPS during moments of heavy terrain destruction load.
- •Update to the latest Adrenalin drivers: RDNA cards have had specific UE4 performance improvements that directly benefit DRG.
Sistema
- •Install the game on an SSD if possible: procedural cave generation on mission start and biome texture streaming benefit noticeably from low load times.
- •Close third-party overlays (Discord, GeForce Experience, MSI Afterburner) if you notice HUD micro-stutter: DRG is more sensitive to UE4 overlay hooks than other games on the engine.
- •In 4-player missions and Elite Deep Dives, prioritize a CPU with good per-core performance: large-swarm AI pathfinding and destruction physics are more CPU-limited than GPU-limited at those moments.
5. Known game issues
Frametime drops during massive terrain destruction
Detonating large charges (Driller C4, large-scale gold rush, or drilling wide areas) can cause a momentary frametime spike while the engine recalculates the voxelized mesh of the destroyed terrain. It's more noticeable in long missions where a lot of terrain has been excavated cumulatively.
Shader compilation stutter when changing biome
When entering a new or rarely visited biome, the game may compile shaders on the fly, causing brief stutters in the first seconds of the mission. It usually disappears after playing the same biome several times thanks to the system's shader cache.
FPS drops during large swarms and Mactera events
Swarm events (especially with the "Swarmageddon" mission modifier or Mactera Grabber swarms) generate an AI and physics load that can saturate the CPU on low/mid-range rigs, causing punctual FPS drops independent of graphics settings.
6. Frequently asked questions
Does Deep Rock Galactic support DLSS or FSR?▾
Why does my FPS drop specifically when I excavate a lot of terrain?▾
Is DRG more CPU-limited or GPU-limited?▾
Is it worth playing on Ultra if I have a mid-range GPU?▾
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Calculate FPS for Deep Rock Galactic →Calculations based on consensus of technical sources and our own FPS model. More about our methodology →