Recommended In-game Graphics Settings

[Kris]

Introduction

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Below are recommended in-game graphics settings for players that have a decent computer and want a good balance between frames per second and image quality. You can always do your own experimentation with the settings. For those who want to deep-dive into what each settings does, scroll to the bottom for the source.

Graphics

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Texture Quality: Very High
- Performance: With no fancy features tucked away in Texture Quality's detail levels, performance is nearly identical on every setting.

Shader Quality: High
- Performance: Between Very High and High the adjustments to Shader Quality have a minimal impact on overall fidelity, but on Normal almost all scenes are badly affected, in particular those in the city where Anisotropic Filtering no longer functions correctly. For most players then, High is the target.

Shadow Quality: High
- Performance: Shadow Quality can have a moderate performance impact, and its higher detail levels can consume copious amounts of VRAM, but given the improvement to fidelity game-wide it's more than worth it.

Reflection Quality: High / Very High
- Performance: Like many other settings, the performance impact of Reflections can vary greatly. More vehicles, windows, water, and buildings add additional reflections, and higher Distance Scaling settings add more detail to be reflected. Given the performance impact of Very High and Ultra Reflections in intensive scenarios, and the massive hit to image quality on Normal, players should be aiming for High at the very minimum, perhaps at the cost of other settings even. If you're really particular about your hair, you'll want to upgrade to Very High for sharp, detailed reflections in the game's barber shops.

Reflection MSAA: Off
- Performance: Given the negligible improvement in image quality, you can safely disable Reflection MSAA on any system.

Water Quality: High
- Performance: Minimal gains are to be had when compromising the fidelity of every puddle, pond and pool in Grand Theft Auto V, so we'd recommend leaving Water Quality on High at the very least, on any system.

Particles Quality: Very High
- Performance: In general, expect to see effects at a slightly higher detail level, and with a few more particles when dialling up Particles Quality. In larger fire fights, and a series of staged explosions, the quantity of extra particles can add up, but never did we observe a huge reduction in performance. At most, perhaps expect a 6-10 FPS reduction in the most intensive scenarios.

Grass Quality: Normal
- Performance: Grass Quality has the largest impact on performance of any setting in the entire game, even with shadow quality settings at their lowest values. Only the fastest of systems can cope with Grass Quality Ultra, and only recent systems will comfortably manage Very High. For everyone else, High should be the target given the significant loss of fidelity on Normal, where almost all foliage is removed.

Soft Shadows: NVIDIA PCSS / AMD CHS
- Performance: Grand Theft Auto V is full of shadows, each cast from different distances and heights. By enabling NVIDIA PCSS these shadows accurately reflect the position of their caster, greatly improving the realism of the world. With every other setting maxed out, the cost of Soft Shadows is 6.4 frames per second at the very most; a comparatively low number given the improvement to every single scene.

Post FX: High / Very High / Ultra (For those with a beefier computer)
- Performance: Curiously, some players report sizable performance gains by lowering Post FX from Ultra to Very High, gaining them up to 10 frames per second. It's recommended you test the setting locally to determine its impact on your machine. Given the loss of fidelity on Normal, and the relatively minor performance impact of this setting (in our testing), we'd recommend Very High for players looking to improve performance but retain a decent level of image quality.

Motion Blur Strength: Personal Preference

In-Game Depth Of Field Effects: Personal Preference
- Performance: If you like Depth of Field you'll be losing 1.6 frames per second at most during gameplay, and a few more frames per second during cut scenes, but as those are non-interactive the loss of performance typically isn't felt.

Anisotropic Filtering: 16x
- Performance: Anisotropic Filtering sharpens distant textures and those viewed on an angle. In Grand Theft Auto V it functions as you would expect and with a minimal performance impact, as you would hope.

Ambient Occlusion: High
- Performance: In its current, somewhat functional state, Ambient Occlusion costs a few frames per second, and adds greatly to image quality, making it a must-have setting.

Tessellation: Very High
- Performance: Tessellation's impact will vary depending on your location and the number of visible tessellated game elements, but in general the performance cost of this subtle feature is rarely felt.

Advanced Graphics

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Long Shadows: Off
- Performance: Given the subtlety of the effect, one can safely disable Long Shadows and recoup the three frames per second.

 

High Resolution Shadows: Off
- Performance: This Advanced shadow setting ensures maximum shadow fidelity, but with its relatively large performance impact players on lower-end systems benefit more from enabling 'Soft' Soft Shadows, instead of 'Sharp' High Resolution Shadows. This will mask not only the loss of shadow fidelity, but also the increase in shadow aliasing when High Resolution Shadows are disabled. In some cases expect to see the performance cost of High Resolution Shadows increase. Most commonly, this occurs in rural areas thick in Ultra and Very High grass. Note, Shadow Quality must be set to Very High for High Resolution Shadows to function.

High Detail Streaming While Flying: Off (Those who fly can set it to on)
- Performance: Like many other Grand Theft Auto V settings, the impact of High Detail Streaming While Flying varies with your location, your other settings, and in this case with your altitude, too.

Extended Distance Scaling: 0%
- Performance: Rendering every single game element at a significantly higher detail level has an unsurprisingly large impact on performance. And as before, the impact of Extended Distance Scaling varies between locations, and with the detail levels of your other settings. Of all settings, Extended Distance Scaling has the largest performance impact when you factor in the added simultaneous hit from civilians, heavy traffic, police chases, explosions, and grass, which is impossible to accurately portray in benchmarks. It is strongly recommended, therefore, that you only use this setting on the most powerful of machines as it will crush your performance.

Frame Scaling Mode: Off

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Source: Grand Theft Auto V PC Graphics & Performance Guide | GeForce (nvidia.com)

[Antonio_Colombo]

Interesting, having all on low + some config modifications to disable unnecessary settings, I'm squeezing around 140-150 fps max in secluded areas, while having around 100 +/- 10-15 frames in more crowded places like mission row. My system: i7-4790k @ 4,6GHz, 2x8gb 2133 MHz ddr3, Rtx2060 and ssd. Will try some tweaks for better quality, and will let know how it affected fps. 

P. S. Best thing was when Nvidia game filters were working for ragemp, I could easily set all visual stuff on low and tweak filters so it looked like on high setting, wish they would make it work again, or at least someone would find a way to get game filter trough the joke of an EAC that Rockstar implemented. 

 

Update 29.12.2022 : yes, the tweaks do not eat fps more than I expected, game still runs smoothly with previously mentioned fps ranges, but looks way better. I'm not sure why I did not do much research about what graphics settings eats up fps and which don't. 

Edited December 29, 2022 by Antonio_Colombo

[Kris]

bump

[Antonio_Colombo]

Update 20.04.2024:

Changed hardware to i5-12400f, 2x8Gb ddr4 3200mhz cl12, nvme m.2 pci3 @ 3.200MB/s avg sec/random, still rtx2060.

No issues, now game engine is the limiting factor in most scenarios, so its capped at ~169fps stable.

Only exceptions are really crowded areas, events etc.

Settings on avg high, and nvidia game filters work well without much issues!