How to improve FPS in Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord (PC)
Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord isn't a game that suffers from the graphics engine itself, but from what you ask it to calculate: sieges and field battles with up to 1,000 units on screen, each running its own combat AI, pathfinding, and per-hit collision physics. That makes Bannerlord one of the titles in the catalog most dependent on a single fast CPU core, well ahead of the GPU.
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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 +73% free FPS.
Battle Size
By far the setting with the biggest impact in the game. Every added unit isn't just another model: it's an entity with combat AI and pathfinding constantly recalculating. Lowering from 1000 to 300-500 troops drastically reduces CPU load in sieges and open field.
Corpse Limit
Bodies that remain on the field after death continue to be physically simulated for a while. In long battles this accumulates and generates constant micro-stutter.
Grass Density
Dense grass on open-field maps adds rendering cost and, to a lesser degree, physical collision cost with units.
Draw Distance: Objects/Agents
In siege maps with large castles, rendering troops and objects at maximum distance adds CPU and GPU cost. Reducing this distance makes distant units use simplified models and logic.
Motion Blur / Particle Quality
Motion blur in melee combat with a constantly moving camera doesn't add clarity. Dust, blood, and smoke particles in massive battles also add up to accumulated GPU cost.
2. Medium impact settings
Here's where most of the FPS is. Minor visual impact, major performance impact.
Texture Quality
Bannerlord uses high-resolution textures for armor, banners, and terrain that demand a fair amount of VRAM. On GPUs with 4-6GB of VRAM, lowering from Ultra to Medium avoids stuttering from video memory saturation.
Shadow Quality
With hundreds of units on screen, each casting a dynamic shadow, shadow rendering cost scales much worse than in games with few characters.
Cloth Simulation
Layered cloth simulation on flags and some armor pieces adds extra physics calculations per unit. With hundreds of troops on screen, this cost multiplies.
Audit Active Mods
Bannerlord has a huge modding community and many players run 20-50 active mods. A single poorly optimized mod (especially those that raise the troop limit) can drag down performance more than any graphics setting.
Resolution Scale
Slightly lowering the internal render resolution reduces GPU load without changing the monitor's output resolution.
3. Upscaling (DLSS / FSR / XeSS)
The biggest gain in the game. Compatible with almost any modern GPU.
No native DLSS/FSR
+0% FPSBannerlord runs on TaleWorlds's proprietary engine and doesn't include native support for DLSS, FSR, or XeSS. Since it's a game whose main bottleneck is the CPU (not the GPU) in its most demanding scenes, upscaling wouldn't solve the real problem anyway.
4. Tips by GPU
NVIDIA
- •Enable "Prefer Maximum Performance" in the NVIDIA control panel for the Bannerlord executable, preventing the GPU from clocking down in menus or campaign where load is intermittent.
- •With RTX 30-series or higher GPUs, the graphics card is rarely the bottleneck in Bannerlord; it doesn't make sense to invest in a more powerful GPU for massive sieges.
- •Update to the latest Game Ready drivers before long campaign sessions: TaleWorlds releases patches frequently.
AMD
- •On Radeon GPUs, enable Radeon Chill with a moderate FPS limit during world-map campaign play to reduce power draw and temperature without affecting battles.
- •Disable Radeon Image Sharpening if you notice odd artifacts on terrain textures after a Bannerlord patch.
- •Don't expect FPS gains in large sieges just from upgrading your GPU tier: the money pays off more invested in a CPU with better per-core performance.
Sistema
- •By far the game in the catalog where single-core CPU speed matters most: prioritize frequency and IPC over core count when choosing a processor.
- •Install the game on an SSD (NVMe if possible): large siege maps with many textures load noticeably more smoothly.
- •Close third-party overlays during massive battles: since the game already saturates one CPU core, any additional process competing for that same thread is felt much more than in other games.
5. Known game issues
Severe FPS drop when starting large battles or sieges
Framerate can plummet from 100+ FPS on the campaign map to 30-40 FPS or less the instant a battle or siege starts with Battle Size at maximum. It's directly tied to combat AI processing on a single thread, not a one-off glitch.
Cumulative micro-stutter in long battles
In sieges that drag on for several minutes, framerate tends to progressively degrade as corpses, embedded projectiles, and physical objects accumulate on the battlefield, even if the number of living units decreases.
Inconsistent performance with troop-management or AI mods
Very popular mods that raise Battle Size above the official cap or alter tactical AI behavior can cause much bigger FPS drops than in vanilla, even on powerful hardware.
6. Frequently asked questions
Why does my powerful PC suffer FPS drops in sieges when the campaign map runs perfectly?▾
Is it worth upgrading to a more powerful GPU to play Bannerlord?▾
What's the ideal Battle Size to avoid losing performance?▾
Do Bannerlord mods significantly affect performance?▾
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Calculate FPS for Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord →Calculations based on consensus of technical sources and our own FPS model. More about our methodology →