Lame frames got you down before a raid? Here’s how to see your in-game FPS in World of Warcraft, along with some frame-saving techniques.
Believe it or not, World of Warcraft is a game of frames. Despite being almost twenty years-old, frame rate spikes are a common occurrence in the elder statesman of MMORPGs. Often it is due to things such as population in any given area, the number of spells on screen at once, or even background processes. Which is to say that sometimes you need to know your current FPS in World of Warcraft.
We've got the answer to this eternal questions below, along with a few hints on how to get your frame rate back into the triple digits.
How to see your FPS in World of Warcraft
The keybind for checking your in-game FPS in World of Warcraft is left-CTRL+R. This keybind can be changed by going into the Options menu, navigating to Keybindings, and locating Toggle Framerate Display.
The toggle is useful for a number of reasons, which includes understanding why and how your in-game framerate may spike. The biggest culprits are capital cities such as Dragonflight's Valdrakken, as well as raids that feature more than ten players. This is especially true during boss encounters, as the number of visual effects on-screen can sometimes cause your FPS in World of Warcraft to dramatically skip and jump around.
So, what then?
Tips for increasing your framerate in WoW
Watching your frames go up and down like a confused garage door? Here's some quick tips for getting that FPS back up into prime form.
- Turn off ray-tracing
Yes, those sunshafts are super cool. However, World of Warcraft already eats a ton of resources and toggling off ray-tracing is an easy way to get your FPS back up.
- Set your raid graphics settings
In a raid with bad frames? WoW has graphical options that only apply to when you're in a raid group. Make use of that settings slider and make sure you're able to move around freely, lest you stand in some fire and wipe the raid.
- Close down your web browser
Browsers such as Chrome and Edge are absolute resource hogs. And, for better and worse, how much available memory at any given time has a big effect on your FPS in World of Warcraft. To get that number up consider closing your browser--especially if you're using Google Chrome.
Follow these tips and you too can brag about getting 200+ frames in a 20 year-old game!
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