How to improve FPS in Star Wars Outlaws (PC)
Star Wars Outlaws, developed by Massive Entertainment on the Snowdrop engine, is one of the most demanding 2024 titles in terms of hardware requirements. Unlike almost any other open-world game, Ray Tracing here is NOT optional: it's mandatory across every graphics preset, including the lowest, because the game's global illumination system depends on it to render shadows and indirect lighting. This means even relatively recent mid-range GPUs struggle to maintain a stable 60 FPS, and cards with no RT support are directly excluded from running the game. This guide covers the settings with the biggest real performance impact, upscaling techniques (practically essential), and the port's known technical issues.
This is what you'd gain with a NVIDIA RTX 3050
Want the RTX 3050 at the best price?
Check the current price on Amazon.
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 +50% free FPS.
Ray Tracing Resolution / RT Shadows
Although Ray Tracing can't be fully disabled, you can reduce its internal resolution and the quality of traced shadows. Lowering from Ultra/High to Medium significantly reduces GPU load without a very noticeable visual change except in close-up reflections.
Vegetation Density
Toshara's outdoor zones are packed with vegetation with simulated physics and many layers of detail. Reducing vegetation density from Ultra/High to Medium noticeably improves framerate outdoors without affecting environment readability too much.
Population Density (NPCs)
Mirogana and other urban zones generate considerable CPU load from the number of simultaneously simulated NPCs. Lowering this setting eases frametime spikes in the city without visibly emptying it out.
Motion Blur
Motion blur barely weighs on performance, but disabling it improves image clarity in combat and during chases aboard the Trailblazer, with no real FPS cost.
Volumetric Cloud Density
Toshara's volumetric clouds are costly to render in real time. Reducing their density frees up GPU outdoors under clear skies without drastically changing the planet's atmosphere.
2. Medium impact settings
Here's where most of the FPS is. Minor visual impact, major performance impact.
Ray-Traced Reflections
Ray-traced reflections on metallic surfaces and puddles are one of the costliest effects within the game's own mandatory RT system. Lowering them to Low keeps coherent reflections but at a much lower resolution and bounce cost.
Texture Quality
Unlike other settings, textures depend more on available VRAM than on computing power. On GPUs with 8GB or less, lowering from Ultra to High avoids micro-stutters from memory saturation without degrading sharpness much.
Shadow Quality (rasterized)
Besides RT shadows, the game combines traditional rasterized shadows for distant objects. Reducing their resolution eases GPU load in scenes with lots of distant geometry, like Mirogana's exteriors at sunset.
Draw Distance
Reduces the level of detail of distant objects and buildings, especially noticeable in Toshara's panoramic views. The performance saving is considerable but pop-in becomes somewhat more visible at long distances.
Volumetric Fog Quality
Volumetric fog is used a lot in ship and cave interiors for atmosphere. Lowering it to Medium reduces rendering cost in these enclosed areas without losing the overall atmosphere.
3. Upscaling (DLSS / FSR / XeSS)
The biggest gain in the game. Compatible with almost any modern GPU.
NVIDIA DLSS 3 (with Frame Generation)
+55% FPSStar Wars Outlaws supports full DLSS 3 with Frame Generation on RTX 40-series GPUs, which practically doubles perceived framerate. RTX 20/30 series have access to DLSS 2 (Super Resolution) without frame generation. Since RT is mandatory, DLSS is the most important tool to make the title playable at 1440p/4K.
AMD FSR 3 (with Frame Generation)
+45% FPSThe game includes FSR 3.1 with Frame Generation, compatible with any modern GPU regardless of brand. The performance jump is notable, though image quality and edge stability are somewhat inferior to DLSS in fast motion.
Intel XeSS
+40% FPSXeSS support present since launch, with good results on Intel Arc GPUs thanks to hardware acceleration (XMX), and also available as a quality alternative on other brands' GPUs via DP4a mode.
Balanced/Performance Mode at 1080p
+35% FPSGiven how demanding the mandatory RT is, even at 1080p it's recommended to use upscaling in Balanced or Performance mode on mid-range GPUs to reach a stable 60 FPS, unusual for this resolution in other games.
4. Tips by GPU
NVIDIA
- •Enable DLSS Frame Generation if you have an RTX 40-series card: it's the biggest performance jump available in this game given the fixed cost of mandatory RT.
- •On RTX 20/30 series, use DLSS Quality or Balanced instead of drastically lowering the RT resolution, since NVIDIA's upscaling keeps image stability in motion better than manually reducing effects.
- •Update to the latest game-specific Game Ready drivers: Star Wars Outlaws received several driver patches with double-digit performance stability improvements after launch.
AMD
- •Use FSR 3 with Frame Generation on RX 6000/7000 to offset the fixed cost of RT, which proportionally penalizes AMD GPUs more since they lack RT units as efficient as NVIDIA's.
- •On RDNA2 GPUs (RX 6000), prioritize lowering RT resolution and reflections before other settings, since ray tracing performance is the main bottleneck on this architecture.
- •Check that Smart Access Memory (Resizable BAR) is enabled in the BIOS alongside a compatible Ryzen processor: in this game it delivers a measurable improvement due to the large amount of streamed geometry and texture data.
Sistema
- •Install the game on an SSD (preferably NVMe): texture and geometry streaming in Toshara and Mirogana causes severe pop-in and stutter if run from an HDD.
- •Make sure you have at least 16GB of RAM and, if the game resorts to disk-based virtual memory via swapping, consider upgrading to 32GB, since several users reported stutters related to insufficient memory in city scenes.
- •Check that your GPU meets the actual minimum requirement for hardware Ray Tracing support before buying the game: cards without RT units (like the GTX 16 series or RX 5000) cannot run it at all, regardless of other settings.
5. Known game issues
Mandatory Ray Tracing excludes GPUs without RT support
Unlike the vast majority of RT games, Star Wars Outlaws doesn't allow disabling it at any detail level. This sparked strong controversy at launch because numerous GPUs still current in the market (GTX 16 series, RX 5000 and older) were directly unable to run the game.
Disproportionate system requirements for the visual result
Multiple technical analyses pointed out that the game demands considerably higher-end hardware than other open-world titles with similar or superior visual fidelity, attributed to poor optimization of the Snowdrop engine with the mandatory RT implementation.
Stuttering from shader compilation and streaming in Mirogana
When entering or moving quickly through Mirogana's dense zones, some users reported micro-hitches attributed both to on-the-fly shader compilation and to asset streaming, especially noticeable in the first hours of play after each major patch.
Estado: Day-one patch and subsequent 2024 updates reduced the problem without fully eliminating it
6. Frequently asked questions
Can I disable Ray Tracing in Star Wars Outlaws to gain FPS?▾
Why can't my GPU run the game even though it meets the VRAM requirements?▾
Is it necessary to use DLSS or FSR to play well?▾
Which areas of the game affect performance the most?▾
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 Star Wars Outlaws →Calculations based on consensus of technical sources and our own FPS model. More about our methodology →