Low FPS checklist: settings, drivers, power plan, and thermals

Use this practical checklist to troubleshoot low FPS on a Windows gaming PC or laptop—starting with the biggest settings wins, then moving through drivers, Windows power modes, and thermal throttling.

Do check: Starting points

By the time someone is frustrated enough to ask for help, they want answers, and they want them now. Slow it down, and do steps in order. Get overexposed in the diagnostics. Reproduce the problem in the same spot / benchmark, then change ONE thing at a time to understand what does and doesn’t help your situation.

1. If you have an FPS cap, look for it first! Via V-Sync, or frame limiter, and especially if you have an “eco” power mode (Radeon Chill/stuff like that).
2. If you still dropping FPS? Drop the big FPS hitters first. Resolution/render scale, ray tracing, and shadows are usually the biggest. View distance is an FPS eater too.
3. Check if there’s an update available for your GPU driver! Definitely update! And if you’ve switched GPUs switching so many times or crashing/cold booting over and over, you’d do well to do a clean install of your driver.
4. Swap that Windows Power mode to Best performance, and make sure it’s plugged in if you see that option!
5. Watch those thermals and clocks! If you’re pushing those temps to their limits, your clocks might drop, and you’re throttling. Fix your cooling, take a look at the airflow in your case. A 60Hz monitor that supports 144Hz will not lower GPU FPS, but it will be choppier and make you think the issue lies elsewhere. Windows lets you see/change your refresh rate under Settings > System > Display > Advanced display.
6. Disable frame cap that may be on. Check for in-game FPS limiter, V-Sync, driver level cap, battery-saver mode, and “quiet/eco” profiles.
7. If you happen to be on AMD, check whether you have Radeon Chill toggled on (it intentionally regulates/caps FPS to save power).
8. If you’re on a laptop on battery power, plug it in, and test again—many laptops will aggressively throttle CPU/GPU power limits while on battery, and this may look like a mysterious low FPS.

Tip: If your FPS is stuck on suspiciously round numbers (30, 60, 90, 120) treat it as a cap until proven otherwise. Remove caps first, then optimize quality settings.

Step 2) In-game settings checklist (highest impact first)

Again, if you’re actively troubleshooting, don’t start willy-nilly with 15 settings to tweak. Tweak 4-6 things that look like they’d have the biggest impact first, then go use the game settings for fine tuning.

Quick “baseline preset” for troubleshooting

• Set resolution to native, then set render scale to 80–90% (or enable DLSS/FSR/XeSS in Quality).
• Turn ray tracing Off (just for the test).
• Set shadows to Medium.
• Set view distance / crowd density to High (not Ultra).
• Turn motion blur Off (preference; not usually an FPS fix, but helps clarity while testing).

If that baseline doesn’t improve FPS much, the problem is more likely drivers, power limits, thermals, or a CPU bottleneck than a single “too-high” visual setting.

Step 3) Windows graphics settings that actually matter (especially for borderless/windowed)

On Windows 11, borderless/windowed performance can depend on Windows graphics features and per-app GPU selection—particularly on laptops with integrated + discrete graphics.

1. Enable “Optimizations for windowed games” (Windows 11): Settings > System > Display > Graphics, then under Default settings toggle Optimizations for windowed games On, and restart the game.
2. Force the game to use the high-performance GPU (if you have more than one GPU): Settings > System > Display > Graphics > find/add the game > Options > choose High performance, then Save.
3. If performance gets worse after enabling windowed optimizations for a specific title, turn it off just for that game in the same Graphics options menu and retest.

Note: If you play in exclusive fullscreen, “windowed optimizations” may not change anything. It’s still worth testing if you use borderless/windowed.

Step 4) Drivers checklist (GPU first, then platform)

Outdated or corrupted GPU drivers can cause low FPS, stutter, crashes, or the game using the wrong GPU. Update your drivers early in your troubleshooting, of course, but do it with intent so you can roll them back fairly easily.

• NVIDIA: update (and maybe a performance power mode)
  Update to a current driver using NVIDIA’s update mechanism (or their app/tooling if they’ve set your driver up that way). If you’re seeing clock speeds dropping incorrectly, and you’ve got low FPS, test NVIDIA Control Panel > Manage 3D settings > Power management mode > Prefer maximum performance (this is a global or per-game option). On some supported notebooks, NVIDIA Control Panel may have notebook power modes (Performance/Balanced/Quiet) that can directly influence your gaming performance.
• AMD: check for updates and remove FPS caps like Chill when diagnosing
  Under AMD Radeon Settings/Software, you can see your current driver version, and check for updates. If Radeon Chill is enabled (globally or per-game), it can cap/regulate your FPS based on how much you’re moving around. Disable it during troubleshooting, then enable it later if you want that power savings.
• Intel (integrated or Arc): update the right way
  The easiest way to scan and install Intel driver updates is usually via Intel Driver & Support Assistant (Intel DSA). Many laptops have their PC maker (OEM) customize graphics drivers, though. If you’ve recently installed Intel generic drivers and they won’t install or are behaving strangely, look for your OEM drivers first on their support site.

Step 6) Detect throttling, then fix the root cause.

The CPU or GPU reduces its clock speeds to avoid damaging itself when temperatures reach a certain point—that’s thermal throttling. The good news is you don’t have to worry about your hardware turning into a molten puddle—you can unstick it.

Result can look like: FPS starts fine, then drops gradually (or all of a sudden) and stays low until the thing cools off. Intel refers to throttling as dropping clock speed when temp exceeds the fabled processor limit (TJ Max/Tcase), in order to avoid melting anything.

How to confirm you’re throttling (the fast way)

1. Load a scene where you suspect your system might be throttling, then load open any performance overlay (game, Steam, GPU software, whatever) which shows you GPU/CPU clocks and temperatures. (We have a cool software tool for doing this, hint hint)
2. Run that same basic scene for say 5-10 minutes.
3. If temperatures climb to a ceiling and clocks fall to bottom (and FPS follows), you’re throttling.
4. If temperatures are okay, but clocks are low, look at power limits in step 5 or background load in step 7.

Fixes that usually do the trick (desktop and laptop)

• Clean dust from intakes, fans, heatsinks (compressor but take care not to use air strong enough to overspin fans; hold them for overblow).
• Improve airflow: move the off carpet, give the case more elbow room, tidier cables, check fans are spinning right and all that.
• Basics for laptops: Elevate rear for better intake, don’t use on soft surfaces, consider a cooling pad if you think your model can use it.
• If comfortable doing so: reseat the cooler on desktop and replace the thermal paste. If it seems obvious, do it, because it most definitely will help. All repasting is a laptop cop out however, and the practice is largely scripty by model—all sorts of strange flats inside that frighten me. If unsure, just go get some lumps placed by a dude at the repair shop.

Step 7) The quick checks people miss (that actually cause FPS fluctuations)

• Background load: browser tabs, game launchers downloading updates, RGB/monitoring utilities you don’t need running while testing.
• Windows updates and reboots: If Windows just updated then reboot once before running your tests again (pending tasks can affect performance).
• Storage: Games on a near-full drive or a slower spinning HDD can hitch like crazy – feeling a lot like “low FPS”. Ensure there is sufficient room on the drive and prefer SSDs for modern titles.
• Fullscreen vs. Borderless: Try switching mode. On some systems weirdly, borderless does better with Windows optimizations for fullscreen/windowed applications, and on other systems it may be better to use exclusive fullscreen.
• VRAM/RAM Pressure: If you crank textures up over your GPU’s VRAM limit you may get weird stutter and low 1% lows. Either reduce textures or close down background applications.

A repeatable flow to troubleshoot perf issues (so you’re not just chasing your tail)

1. Baseline: Run your test and save FPS AND temps/clocks.
2. Remove caps: Disable V-Sync/frame limiters/Radeon Chill and re-test.
3. Big settings: Reduce resolution scale and/or disable RT and retest.
4. Windows graphics: Ensure High performance GPU is selected and enable windowed optimizations if you are using borderless and retest.
5. Drivers: Re-install/update GPU driver and retest.
6. Power mode: Set Windows Power mode to Best performance and retest (plug in laptops).
7. Thermals: If there is throttling, ensure cooling is fixed and retest.
8. Only once you’ve done the above: Tweak quality sliders back up to the highest setting you can maintain at the target FPS.

Symptom-to-fix cheat sheet

“FPS known to be low or CPU known to be maxed” frustrate the heck out of me. But, thankfully, not every game is difficult to drive. ABCDEFGhY can accommodate most gamers, so let’s take a little shortcut to the tweak that will solve it!

FAQ: Common low-FPS troubleshooting