You may spend prime greenback for fancy new graphics card {hardware}, however one of many key parts to gaming efficiency is definitely software program. While the brute pressure of the {hardware} will get a lot of the glory (and is certainly important), the software program facet is the magic that items it collectively. Without good software program, even the ferocious Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 is decreased to a flowery paperweight—particularly when working Cyberpunk 2077‘s glorious new path traced Overdrive mode. 

Software may also considerably enhance the {hardware} efficiency. Enter Nvidia’s DLSS 3.0, or Deep Learning Super Sampling. Including each AI-powered body era and Nvidia’s wondrous latency-reducing Reflex technology, DLSS 3.0 makes for a potent recipe. And with the disclosing of affordable new GeForce RTX 4060 and 4060 Ti graphics playing cards, this incredible know-how is about to grow to be much more accessible.

This isn’t the identical outdated DLSS upsampling you’re used to, nonetheless. We’re going to go over some fundamentals of what DLSS 3.0 is, and its utility to Nvidia’s RTX 40-series GPUs. We’ll let you understand how to make use of this function, and inform you about optimum settings on some common supported video games. Let’s get cracking.

Further studying: The best graphics cards for PC gaming

How does DLSS 3 work?

DLSS 3 drastically accelerates gaming body charges utilizing a mix of AI duties working on devoted tensor cores. It has three parts that make it tick. 

Super Resolution (a.okay.a. DLSS 2)

Also often called tremendous sampling, DLSS 3’s core “upscaler” performance is definitely the DLSS 2 know-how already built-in into numerous video games. DLSS renders recreation imagery at a decrease decision than your monitor runs at to extend uncooked gaming body charges, then makes use of AI tensor cores to reconfigure the picture with machine studying in order that it seems to be sharp in your display. This bypasses the efficiency penalty that your larger decision would impose, whereas protecting graphics constancy excessive. 

Frame era

The novel factor to DLSS 3 is within the “Optical Multiframe Generation” AI know-how. After analyzing two pictures from a recreation back-to-back, DLSS 3 makes use of this data to insert an additional AI-created body that doesn’t should be rendered by the sport itself. This result’s in even larger body charges than commonplace DLSS 2. It may also assist dramatically improve the smoothness in CPU bottlenecked video games. 

Nvidia Reflex low latency

The third piece of the puzzle is in Nvidia’s Reflex know-how. Frame era shouldn’t be free. Those AI-generated frames aren’t managed by the participant, because the recreation isn’t rendering them, so it could possibly truly add latency (learn: cut back responsiveness) in video games. To fight this, Nvidia Reflex helps harmonize the GPU and CPU in order that latency is decreased. It helps to bypass the standard bottlenecks offered by each the GPU and CPU by deeper integration into the sport engine itself. Reflex was created years in the past to improve performance in esports games to amazing effect, however Nvidia now requires it in video games that help DLSS 3.

Speaking of…  

What do you might want to run DLSS 3?

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An RTX 40-series graphics card

DLSS 3 is unique to Nvidia’s “Ada Lovelace” RTX 40-series graphics playing cards. It is obtainable for each desktop and laptop computer choices, however not any RTX 30-series or prior GPUs. 

Nvidia says that’s as a result of the brand new Lovelace GPU structure contains extra highly effective AI tensor cores and, extra critically, a brand new “Optical Flow Accelerator” that gives scene motion information crucial to creating these AI frames. Performance on RTX 30 or older GPUs wouldn’t present an excellent expertise, so for now this know-how is restricted to the extra highly effective {hardware}. Currently, 4 RTX 40-series graphics playing cards can be found that meet these necessities:

DLSS 3 shouldn’t be supported on rival AMD Radeon or Intel Arc graphics playing cards.

Certain Windows settings should be lively

You’ll additionally must activate “Hardware Accelerated GPU” in your Windows show settings. (Settings > System > Display > Related Sections > Graphics > Change Default Graphics Settings > Toggle Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling on)

Certain in-game settings should be lively

Only particular video games instantly help DLSS 3. You’ll should activate “Frame Generation” settings after activating DLSS upscaling. This will even necessitate “Nvidia Reflex” being turned on, and most (however not all) video games will do that by default. You’ll additional have the choice to set Reflex to further “Boost.” 

Supported DLSS 3 video games

There are at the moment over 25 video games which might be playable now, with many extra coming. High profile titles like Cyberpunk 2077 and Forza Horizon 5 have just lately acquired DLSS 3 updates, together with new releases equivalent to Hogwarts Legacy. Rock Paper Shotgun maintains a useful information to all obtainable and upcoming DLSS 3 video games (they’re after the ray traced and DLSS video games within the record).

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What are DLSS 3’s drawbacks?

DLSS 3 is incredible for rising total visible smoothness, however because it develops throughout its early days, it additionally has a number of potential points to pay attention to. 

Latency

While Nvidia Reflex addresses lots of DLSS 3’s latency issues, it’s additionally not the speedy response some customers might anticipate from esports titles. That’s why DLSS 3 is best suited to single participant video games equivalent to Cyberpunk 2077, Plague Tale Requiem, Microsoft Flight Simulator, and many others. Even with Reflex on, DLSS 3 can play a kind of trick in your thoughts in case you’re particularly delicate to how briskly body charges and responsiveness are intertwined, as PCWorld’s Brad Chacos defined throughout his evaluation of the RTX 4090:

“While the DLSS 3 experience shines, it doesn’t always feel more responsive in your hands. Running Cyberpunk 2077 at 138fps with every possible bell and whistle active thanks to DLSS 3 looks absolutely stunning, full stop. But one of the perks of faster frame rates is increased responsiveness, and while Reflex greatly helps with that, Cyberpunk 2077 running at 138fps doesn’t feel substantially more responsive than running it at the 77fps or so it hits in native 4K. Having twice as many frames looks fantastic but those AI frames aren’t responding to your controls in the actual moment, though it’s close.

This is not a negative. This is not a drawback. It can’t be after running Flight Sim at 120fps, and Cyberpunk 2077 with ultra ray tracing at 138fps (the RTX 3090 tops out at 48fps). But it’s worth highlighting.”

Visual artifacts

Most of the DLSS 3 gaming expertise seems to be incredible. You gained’t discover any visible points or quirks. That stated, there are some video games that showcase some onscreen “artifacts” or abnormalities. UI parts may also not be displayed correctly in some titles, all areas which might be present process enchancment. The excellent news is that software program updates can treatment these points as players age. The Hardware Unboxed deep dive embedded under does an excellent job of strolling by means of DLSS 3’s visible high quality, together with highlighting potential quirks.

Needs highly effective {hardware}

DLSS 3 reveals a few of its finest outcomes on already highly effective {hardware}, just like the Nvidia RTX 4080 or 4090. It additionally appears to do higher when it’s boosting an already-okay body charge to a better one, equivalent to 60 FPS to 120 FPS. Time will inform if upcoming weaker GPUs such because the RTX 4060 will nonetheless have the identical spectacular outcomes, nevertheless it ought to be promising. 

Settings overload

Console players have it simple with out as a lot customization generally! PC video games not solely have dozens of graphics settings, nevertheless it additionally has completely different ranges for each. Add to that DLSS 3, which now has its personal hierarchy of graphic settings to study.

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DLSS 3 settings defined 

Dozens extra settings variations have entered the fray – making it complicated for players when selecting your graphics settings. After activating DLSS, Frame Generation, and Reflex, you have got a number of extra selections to make.

DLSS function choices

• DLSS Auto: This will try to preserve the frames as finest it could possibly to your monitor’s refresh charge
• DLSS Quality: The finest visible efficiency, with modest or not a lot FPS uplift 
• DLSS Balanced: A great mixture of upper frames and sustaining graphical constancy. 
• DLSS Performance: You’ll discover considerably much less spectacular visuals, however FPS frames are significantly larger. 
• DLSS Ultra-performance: Better FPS, however worse visuals – usually once you actually need to overreach current {hardware} or to hit a selected FPS at a better decision. (8K Gamers, you’ll need to study this one!) 
• DLSS Frame Generation: This setting will simply be a easy “On or Off” toggle in your recreation settings. Remember, you’ll want Ada Lovelace RTX 40 sequence GPUs to work. 

Nvidia Reflex and Boost

These are sometimes discovered close to DLSS choices, however could also be elsewhere in a video menu as nicely (as in Cyberpunk 2077). Nvidia Reflex will typically be turned on robotically in most video games with Frame Generation being lively. That’s not all the time true, nonetheless, and lots of video games allow you to disable Reflex manually even when working DLSS 3 Frame Gen. (We don’t suggest doing that.) You’ll even have the choice for a “Boost” function in lots of video games. Reflex Boost overclocks your GPU so it could possibly assist in CPU restricted eventualities much more. 

Even extra choices

To make issues a bit extra difficult, some video games even permit you to choose solely Nvidia’s DLAA together with Frame Generation and Reflex. Plague Tale’s Requiem is one such title. DLAA mainly runs DLSS at your native monitor decision for enhanced visible sharpness and readability. When given this selection, it gives the best potential graphical setting you possibly can obtain, balanced out by the apparent efficiency price. You can often select DLSS as a substitute if the DLAA efficiency is just too low. 

In most video games, equivalent to Hogwarts Legacy, DLAA will robotically be grayed out when you choose DLSS. 

The finest DLSS 3 settings

Here’s how we use DLSS 3 settings in our personal rigs. For essentially the most highly effective {hardware}, such because the RTX 4080 and 4090, DLSS Quality ought to preserve respectable frames in most video games, even at 4K, and doubly so with DLSS Frame Generation enabled.  If you favor a bit extra pep in efficiency, DLSS Balanced can be the following supreme step.  You may also all the time simply set DLSS to Auto and see in case you’re pleased with the outcomes, as they may range from game-to-game. 

If you have got barely much less highly effective {hardware}, such because the RTX 4070 or some cell RTX 40 GPUs, DLSS Balanced and DLSS Performance grow to be good settings to be sure to’re hitting good frames, with the nod nonetheless going to DLSS Balanced as most popular. We’d usually suggest avoiding DLSS Ultra Performance, because it upscales from such a low decision picture that it degrades visible constancy a noticeable quantity. 

Some video games are simply extra demanding than others, so that you’ll be capable to decide if adjustments are wanted, particularly when including ray tracing. 

DLSS 3: Let’s play some video games! 

Time to place this idea to observe. We’re going to play some notably intense video games and see how DLSS 3 might help. These video games have been examined at 4K, typically with Ultra or related max settings, and ray tracing on. The {hardware} is an MSI Titan GT77 laptop with a 4090 inside, which is analogous to an RTX 3090 Ti desktop GPU in efficiency. 

Keep in thoughts that that is at 4K, so folks enjoying at decrease resolutions equivalent to 1440p or 1080p will all the time see larger FPS on the whole. Ray tracing additionally considerably lowers body charges when on, so disabling that’s one other manner you possibly can obtain larger numbers. The thought with DLSS 3 is that we will have our cake and eat it too! You can expertise ray tracing on Ultra, then flip on DLSS 3 to attain higher efficiency with out compromising on different visible settings. 

DLSS 3: Cyberpunk 2077

Cyberpunk 2077 has been round for a number of years now, and just lately it acquired DLSS 3 help. This recreation is infamous for crushing virtually any GPU when ray tracing is on Ultra so it’s welcomed information.

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Let’s go over how a few of the settings have an effect on the general efficiency by actually pushing the system. On the MSI GT77 Titan, ray tracing on Ultra with none DLSS offers us a measly 27 FPS on this portion. That body charge is just too low to truly play, so let’s see how DLSS 3 might help us with out having to cut back some other graphics settings.

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Next, let’s activate DLSS to Balanced, however with out switching on Frame Generation or Nvidia Reflex. Our body charge jumps to 61, a a lot better outcome. The recreation nonetheless seems to be nice and behaves a lot smoother with this additional FPS increase.

Our subsequent possibility could have us as soon as once more setting DLSS to Balanced, however this time we’re additionally going to activate Frame Generation within the menu. Nvidia Reflex, on the adjoining “Video” menu, will even be on. The outcome right here is considerably higher—a whopping 87 FPS. Remember that we began with simply 27 FPS earlier than turning on any DLSS options. 

How does it play with DLSS 3 Frame Gen lively? Quite nicely, truly. It feels superior in each solution to native rendering, or with simply common DLSS on. The recreation play is easy, and no manifestly apparent artifacts or points current themselves. (They can nonetheless occur, nonetheless, equivalent to UI parts being a bit quirky at instances.) 

The solely draw back right here is that you just’re rising latency, which is considerably by Nvidia Reflex. The latency on this recreation is appropriate, because it’s largely a single participant recreation the place you’re exploring and infrequently participating in sooner scenes. 

A sooner paced recreation, equivalent to a web based multiplayer esports title, shouldn’t be a great match for DLSS 3 as a result of this latency issue.  In Cyberpunk 2077, it really works superbly. You may also activate Frame Generation and Reflex with out DLSS, providing you with FPS of round 47, however right here the better profit appears to be pairing it with DLSS so you possibly can obtain most body charges.

Brad Chacos

In Brad Chacos’ RTX 4090 desktop GPU review, we will see that even this ferocious flagship will get huge assist from DLSS 3. Playing it at 4K decision with ray tracing at Ultra pins the sport to 42 FPS, however DLSS efficiency with Frame Generation brings it to 138 FPS. These are staggering numbers—with ray tracing nonetheless on!

DLSS 3: Hitman 3

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Hitman 3 is a well-liked recreation that additionally taxes programs fairly closely. With ray tracing on and DLSS off, this scene gave us solely round 30 FPS at maxed-out 4K settings. This recreation is very like Cyberpunk 2077, within the sense that it’s a slower paced model recreation, so DLSS 3 generally is a huge assist right here.

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Switching DLSS on to Balanced, however protecting Frame Generation Off, wielded 64 FPS. That’s certainly a big increase, and makes the sport really feel tremendously extra playable and easy.

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Finally, switching DLSS to Balanced, however turning on each Frame Generation and Reflex, give us actually spectacular outcomes. We’re now round 91 FPS, an enormous leap from the unique 30 FPS with out DLSS 3. The recreation feels a lot smoother, and behaves very nicely. It’s troublesome to even discover the DLSS course of occurring except you’re pixel-peeping for it.

Like with the opposite video games, latency will even be elevated, and helped with Nvidia Reflex. This title is one which advantages far more from the upper FPS and higher efficiency, and any further latency shouldn’t be very noticeable. You may also choose solely Frame era and Reflex with out DLSS, providing you with round 50 FPS. We’d nonetheless suggest going all the best way with DLSS Quality or Balanced nonetheless, so that you get all the mixed DLSS 3 advantages. 

DLSS 3: Hogwarts Legacy

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Continuing the pattern of extremely taxing ray traced titles, we arrive at Hogwarts Legacy. Without any DLSS, and when set to Nvidia DLAA, this scene in Hogmeade netted us solely 36 FPS at 4K. Ick. Ray tracing and all settings are set to Ultra.

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We see higher outcomes with DLSS set to Balanced, with body charges hitting round 59. The recreation feels a lot better already, and even the body charge time appears extra constant. (You may also activate simply Frame Generation with out DLSS, getting round 56 FPS, however your latency will even improve extra that manner, so higher to pair it with DLSS.)

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DLSS Balanced alongside Frame Generation and Reflex give us 82 FPS, an enormous increase from the 36 FPS we first noticed. The recreation performs significantly higher, with far more constant and easy efficiency. Without DLSS 3, we’d should decrease ray tracing or regulate different settings to attain higher outcomes, so that is definitely a way more preferable possibility. Reflex stored the sport feeling good and responsive.

DLSS 3: Flight Simulator 2020

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 is a notoriously troublesome recreation to max out because of its superbly expansive open world. It’s a extremely CPU bottlenecked recreation, making an ideal pairing with DLSS 3.

Brad Chacos

The outcomes listed below are nothing in need of spectacular. With the desktop RTX 4090 and a Ryzen 9 5900X processor, 4K native hits a playable 65 FPS—an ordinary outcome for this closely CPU-bottlenecked recreation. Turning on Frame Generation and bypassing that bottleneck brings us to 122 FPS, virtually doubling the visible smoothness by blowing previous the bottleneck with AI frames. Nvidia Reflex helps to maintain the latency in verify, and this can be a recreation typically nicely suited to DLSS 3 enhancements. 

This title additionally has quite a few detailed UI and in-cabin graphics that should be generated correctly, so it’s an excellent check of how DLSS 3 can render minute particulars in sharp readability. While it’s not all the time good, the increase in FPS and bypassing CPU bottlenecks are greater than a win right here. 

DLSS 3: Final ideas 

Nvidia’s DLSS 3 combines the nice advantages of DLSS, together with Frame Generation and Nvidia Reflex. While help continues to be restricted to pick video games and {hardware}, and there are generally niggling artifacting and textual content points, it’s terribly promising. By permitting GPUs to stretch their legs nicely past conventional {hardware} limits, we will expertise larger and higher frontiers in video games as builders benefit from the know-how. 

Sure, you’re getting some extra latency, however Nvidia Reflex does an excellent job at protecting it underneath management. Often, it makes DLSS 3 video games even extra responsive than working at native decision. While you’re not more likely to need to play Counter-Strike or the like with it on, DLSS 3 is a large increase to video games equivalent to Cyberpunk 2077.

With every thing working nicely, DLSS 3 looks like black magic. Games shouldn’t run this good or look this easy. If your PC helps it, we extremely suggest checking it out.

Editor’s be aware: This article first revealed on April 14, 2023, however was up to date to incorporate new RTX 4060 GPUs and explicitly clarify the place to activate Hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling.