Rockstar's sprawling Western epic — a stunning but demanding open world where water and volumetric lighting punish your GPU.
Red Dead Redemption 2 is Rockstar's open-world Western following outlaw Arthur Morgan through the dying days of the Van der Linde gang. Built on the RAGE engine, it renders one of the most detailed environments in PC gaming — dynamic weather, layered volumetric fog, full-resolution water simulation and dense foliage that scales far past what mid-range GPUs can hold at Ultra. The PC port runs on both Vulkan and DirectX 12, with Vulkan generally delivering steadier frame times, and later patches added NVIDIA DLSS and AMD FSR upscaling. It is squarely a GPU-bound title: reflections, water and volumetrics are the settings that decide your frame rate.
Built for competitive players who want the highest frame rate and lowest input latency.
Strips the heaviest GPU effects — water, volumetrics and reflections — to chase the highest, most stable frame rate for Red Dead Online or high-refresh play.
| Setting | Value | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Graphics API | Vulkan | Steadier frame times than DX12 on most GPUs. |
| Screen Type | Fullscreen | Exclusive fullscreen for the lowest input latency. |
| VSync | Off | Removes latency and uncaps FPS. |
| Triple Buffering | Off | — |
| DLSS / Upscaling | Performance | RTX only — renders at low internal res for maximum FPS. |
| Texture Quality | Medium | — |
| Anisotropic Filtering | 4x | — |
| Lighting Quality | Low | — |
| Global Illumination Quality | Low | — |
| Shadow Quality | Low | — |
| Far Shadow Quality | Low | — |
| Screen Space Ambient Occlusion | Low | — |
| Reflection Quality | Low | One of the biggest GPU costs — keep low. |
| Water Quality | Low | The single heaviest setting in the game. |
| Volumetrics Quality | Low | Fog and god-rays; second-heaviest GPU load. |
| Motion Blur | Off | — |
Maximum visual fidelity for players who prefer the best-looking image.
Maximum fidelity — full-resolution water, unlocked volumetric raymarching and Ultra reflections. Demands a high-end GPU, especially above 1080p.
| Setting | Value | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Graphics API | Vulkan | — |
| Screen Type | Fullscreen | — |
| VSync | On (Triple Buffered) | Prevents tearing at capped high-fidelity frame rates. |
| DLSS / Upscaling | DLAA / Off | DLAA gives a native-res image; Quality trades a little sharpness for FPS. |
| Texture Quality | Ultra | Ultra textures want ~6GB+ VRAM — drop to High on 4GB cards. |
| Anisotropic Filtering | 16x | — |
| Lighting Quality | Ultra | — |
| Global Illumination Quality | Ultra | — |
| Shadow Quality | Ultra | — |
| Far Shadow Quality | Ultra | — |
| Screen Space Ambient Occlusion | Ultra (Full Resolution) | — |
| Reflection Quality | Ultra | Among the most demanding settings — heavy in towns and near water. |
| Water Quality | Ultra | The most GPU-intensive setting in RDR2. |
| Volumetrics Quality | Ultra | Unlocked volumetric raymarch resolution; enormous GPU cost. |
| Tessellation Quality | Ultra | — |
| Tree Quality | Ultra | — |
The sweet spot between frame rate and visuals. Drag the slider to shift the balance.
Keeps the world looking rich while pulling the two or three most expensive settings back a notch. The best everyday default for mid-range GPUs.
| Setting | Value | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Graphics API | Vulkan | — |
| Screen Type | Fullscreen | — |
| VSync | Off | — |
| DLSS / Upscaling | Quality | Near-native image with a solid FPS uplift on RTX cards. |
| Texture Quality | High | — |
| Anisotropic Filtering | 8x | — |
| Lighting Quality | High | — |
| Global Illumination Quality | High | — |
| Shadow Quality | Medium | Medium vs High is nearly invisible in motion. |
| Screen Space Ambient Occlusion | Medium | — |
| Reflection Quality | Medium | Big GPU cost — Medium is the sweet spot. |
| Water Quality | High | High looks great; Ultra tanks FPS for little gain. |
| Volumetrics Quality | Medium | Medium keeps fog convincing at a fraction of the cost. |
| Particle Quality | High | — |
| Tessellation Quality | Medium | — |
| Anti-Aliasing (TAA) | High | — |
| Metric | CompetitiveMax FPS | BalancedBalanced | High GraphicsBest Graphics |
|---|---|---|---|
| Input Latency | Lowest | Standard | Standard |
| Graphics Quality | |||
| GPU Usage | Medium | High | Very High |
| Competitive Score | 90/100 | 68/100 | 44/100 |
| Recommended For | Red Dead Online and high-refresh 120Hz+ monitors. | 1080p/1440p on GTX 1660–RTX 3060 class GPUs. | Screenshots, cinematic play and RTX 4070+ / high-end GPUs. |
Official minimum and recommended specs for Red Dead Redemption 2.
| Component | Minimum | Recommended |
|---|---|---|
| OS | Windows 10 - 64-bit | Windows 10 - 64-bit |
| Processor | Intel® Core™ i5-2500K / AMD FX-6300 | Intel® Core™ i7-4770K / AMD Ryzen 5 1500X |
| Memory | 8 GB RAM | 12 GB RAM |
| Graphics | Nvidia GeForce GTX 770 2GB / AMD Radeon R9 280 3GB | Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB / AMD Radeon RX 480 4GB |
| Storage | 150 GB available space | 150 GB available space |
Minimum
Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system OS: Windows 10 - 64-bit Processor: Intel® Core™ i5-2500K / AMD FX-6300 Memory: 8 GB RAM Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 770 2GB / AMD Radeon R9 280 3GB Network: Broadband Internet connection Storage: 150 GB available space Sound Card: Direct X Compatible
Recommended
Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system OS: Windows 10 - 64-bit Processor: Intel® Core™ i7-4770K / AMD Ryzen 5 1500X Memory: 12 GB RAM Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB / AMD Radeon RX 480 4GB Network: Broadband Internet connection Storage: 150 GB available space Sound Card: Direct X Compatible
Source: Steam
Pick your hardware and preset to estimate your frame rate — results update instantly.
Frame generation is never counted: every figure is rendered frames only.
Your Estimated Red Dead Redemption 2 Performance
High (every option) · native · 1080p
90
Low end
100
Estimate
110
High end
FPS values displayed on GamerSpecs are estimates. Actual game performance may vary depending on hardware configuration, drivers, cooling, power limits, background applications, and game updates.
How is this calculated?Safe, technically-sound tips to get the most out of Red Dead Redemption 2.
Choose the Vulkan API over DirectX 12 — on most NVIDIA and AMD GPUs it delivers steadier frame times and quicker loads in RDR2.
Water Quality and Volumetrics are the two heaviest settings; pulling them from Ultra to High/Medium recovers a large chunk of GPU headroom with little visible loss in motion.
On RTX cards enable DLSS (Quality mode) — it renders at a lower internal resolution and reconstructs detail, often adding 30%+ FPS with minimal perceptible loss.
Cap the frame rate to your monitor's refresh rate in-game to smooth the frame pacing RDR2 is prone to in dense towns like Saint Denis.
Match Texture Quality to your VRAM — Ultra textures need roughly 6GB or more, so use High on 4GB cards to avoid VRAM-swap stutter.
Keep TAA enabled but add a light sharpening pass (in-game TAA Sharpening or your driver's sharpening) to counter RDR2's softness without the cost of MSAA.