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Do you want higher frame rates on Borderlands 3? Maybe speed up your PC for gaming in general?
We got you covered!
This is the ultimate Borderlands 3 optimization guide. After following this guide, you’ll experience higher frame rates (FPS) and your games, including Borderlands 3, will run much better.
It’s all about prioritizing the right settings so you will end up with a nice balance of visuals and performance.
We will start with optimizing your PC and then we’ll optimize the settings in Borderlands 3.
How To Optimize Your Borderlands 3 Settings
Part 1
Optimize Your PC Settings
Part 2
Optimize Borderlands 3 Settings
Part 3
Best Gear For Borderlands 3
Optimize Your PC Settings
First of all, ensure that you meet the recommended system requirements for Borderlands 3 listed below. If you don’t meet the minimum system requirements, there’s not much to be done.
If your PC meets the minimum system requirements, but not the recommended system requirements, this guide will still be useful to you.
Minimum System Requirements
- OS: Windows 7/8/10 64-bit
- CPU: Intel Core i5-3570 or AMD FX-8350
- RAM: 6 GB
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 2GB or AMD Radeon HD 7970
- HDD: 75GB
Recommended System Requirements
- OS: Windows 7/8/10 64-bit
- CPU: Intel Core i7-4770 or AMD Ryzen 5 2600
- RAM: 16 GB
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce 1060 6GB or AMD Radeon RX 590
- HDD: 75GB
Update Your GPU Driver
You probably hear this often, but you need to ensure that your GPU drivers are up-to-date. Especially for newly released games, both AMD and NVIDIA release new drivers that are specifically optimized to run those games.
It’s very easy to update your AMD or NVIDIA drivers. Just click on one of the buttons below, which will take you to the download pages. You can also use AMD’s (AMD Radeon Software) or NVIDIA’s (NVIDIA GeForce Experience) own software to update the drivers.
Borderlands 3 AMD Settings Optimization
If you have an AMD graphics card, then follow these steps to optimize Borderlands 3 (and any other game) for your system.
- Open AMD Radeon Software
- Click on the Gaming tab
- Click on Global Settings
- Set Anti-aliasing Mode to Use application settings
- Set Anti-aliasing Method to Multisampling
- Set Morphological Filtering to Off
- Set Anisotropic Filtering Mode to Override application settings
- Set Anisotropic Filtering Level to 2x
- Set Texture Filtering Quality to Performance
- Set Surface Format Optimization to Off
- Set Wait for Vertical Refresh to Always off
- Set to Off
- Set Shader Cache to Off
- Set Tessellation Mode to Override application settings
- Set Maximum Tessellation Level to Off
That’s it! You can set the other settings to whatever you want. You will notice a small but noticeable FPS boost.
Borderlands 3 NVIDIA Settings Optimization
If you have an NVIDIA graphics card, there are some additional optimizations that you can do in NVIDIA Control Panel.
Don’t expect it to do as much of an impact as your in-game settings and hardware though.
- Open NVIDIA Control Panel
- Click on Manage 3D settings
- Now use the dropdown to select the game. If you can’t find it, click on the Add button and then add the game from there.
- Maximum pre-rendered frames must be set to 1
- Power management mode must be set to Prefer maximum performance
- Texture filtering – Quality should be set to High performance for that extra FPS boost
- Threaded optimization must be set to O
- Vertical sync? No. Set it to off
- Click on Apply
- On the left menu, click on Adjust desktop size and position
- Check the Override the scaling mode set by games and programs checkbox
- Click on Apply
Change Your PC's Power Plan
You can now improve the performance in Borderlands 3 by changing your PC’s power plan. By default, the power plan of your PC is set to Balanced. You need to set it to High performance.
Here is how you do it:
- Press on the Windows key to bring up the start menu
- Type powercfg.cpl and press Enter
- Now select the High performance option
Discord Hardware Acceleration
You’re probably using Discord for voice-chatting while playing your games. You should optimize Discord by disabling Hardware Acceleration.
This will also improve the performance in all of your games.
- In Discord, go to User Settings
- Click on Appearance and disable Hardware Acceleration
Google Chrome Hardware Acceleration
Like with Discord, Google Chrome also uses hardware acceleration. You can improve performance in games slightly by turning this feature off.
- In Google Chrome, go to Settings
- On the left tab, click on Advanced and then on System
- Make sure Use hardware acceleration when available is unchecked
Game Mode
Game Mode is a Windows 10 feature that will optimize your PC for play when enabled. We recommend enabling this feature.
It won’t have that much impact on higher-end systems, but for everything else, enabling Game Mode can definitely have a noticeable impact, especially if you run many background applications.
- Open Start and type: Game Mode settings. If your computer can not find the setting, then try
- Open the Settings menu by clicking on the cogwheel icon in the Windows start menu
- Click on the Gaming section
- Click on Game Mode on the left sidebar
- Now set Game Mode to On.
Optimize Your Windows System For The Best Performance
If you’re still not satisfied with your FPS, you can optimize your Windows system and squeeze that extra bit of performance out of it. Follow these steps:
- Open the Windows start menu and type: View advanced system settings and click on the search result
- Now click on Settings under Performance
- Select Adjust for best performance and click on OK
Background Applications
The last tip should be an obvious one – don not run any unnecessary background applications.
For example, you should disable OneDrive if you are not using it. Simply right-click on the OneDrive icon in the taskbar and close it.
Optimize Borderlands 3 Settings
Let’s start optimizing Borderlands 3 now.
Here are some of the features that Borderlands 3 supports.
Unlocked Framerate | Yes (limits of 30, 60, 120 and more supported) |
Graphics Settings | 4 presets, 18 custom quality settings |
Custom Field of View | Yes (separate values for different states supported) |
Other Resolutions | Widescreen, UltraWide, DoubleWide |
Aspect Ratios | Pillarboxing on UltraWide and DoubleWide |
Mods | No |
Now with that out of the way, here are our recommended Borderlands 3 settings. Feel free to balance out the settings to your liking, as every system and preferences differ.
First of all, go to your Video settings in Borderlands 3.
Graphics API: DirectX 11
There may be issues with DirectX 12. After applying the other settings, you can set this to DirectX 12 to see if you experience any issues.
Display Mode: Full Screen
Always select Full Screen for the best performance.
Vertical Sync: Off
You don’t want input lag.
Resolution Scale: 100%
Recommend to set this to 100%. If you want to change the resolution, it is recommended you change the Resolution value and not this one.
Limit Frame Rate: Unlimited
Set this on a capped value if you get bothered by screen tearing artifacts or other issues.
Field of View: 90
The default FoV is fine, but feel free to adjust to your liking.
Vehicle Field of View: 90
HUD Scale: 1
Have difficulty with the HUD size? Then increase this value and vice versa.
Let’s move on over to the advanced settings.
Display Stats: FPS
Check your FPS by setting it to this value.
Anti-Aliasing: FXAA
We recommend setting this to FXAA as it has a negligible effect on performance.
FidelityFX Sharpening: Off
Camera Motion Blur: Off
Object Motion Blur: Off
Graphics Quality: Medium
Texture Streaming: Medium
Anisotropic Filtering: 4x
Material Quality: Low or Medium
This setting has a very large perfromance impact. We recommend setting this to medium for a good balance between performance and visuals, but if you want extra performance, then set this to low.
Shadows: Low
Draw Distance: High or Ultra
You want to see far out in the distance, right?
Environment Texture Detail: High
Environment Detail: Low or Medium
Like with material quality, set this to medium for a good balance of performance and visual quality, but if you want to squeeze that extra bit of performance out of the game, then set this to low.
Terrain Detail: High
Foliage Detail: Low
This setting has a very large performance impact. We recommend setting this to low.
Character Texture Detail: Medium
Character Detail: Medium
Ambient Occlusion: Low
Volumetric Fog: Off
This setting has a huge impact on performance. We recommend setting this to off unless your system can handle it and it is worth the performance hit.
Screen Space Reflections: Medium
Best Gear For Borderlands 3
We find the products below to be the best gear that you can get at the moment.
We always keep this updated throughout our whole website, so rest assured that these are top-tier products right now and in the foreseeable future.
Mouse
Logitech G Pro Wireless
Keyboard
Corsair K70 RGB MK.2
Monitor
Dell Alienware AW2518H
Headset
Beyerdynamic DT 990 Pro
Mousepad
HyperX Fury S Pro SE XL
Conclusion
You should now have an optimized PC and Borderlands 3 game. Enjoy the extra performance!
