TES Skyrim: Increase your FPS/Performance efficiently.

In this guide you'll learn how to properly set your game options, configure your .ini files and fix some issues, in order to make your game experience smoother and more enjoyable.

If you find this guide helpful, please rate it and if you got any suggestion or question post a comment below.

Introduction

Hi, in this guide you'll learn how to properly set your game options, configure your .ini files, fix various issues, maximizing your whole game experience.

Note: i'm not responsible if the settings you apply to the game will cause its malfunction. However these problems can commonly be solved by reinstalling the game or cleaning the settings files. Follow this guide at your own risk.

This guide is meant to help the players to get a better game experience, even on low end computers, gaining more FPS and maybe fixing some issues.

In game settings

In this section, you'll learn how to set your in game settings correctly, making the game look good and smooth.
So, start up the game, click on OPTIONS.
Graphics Adapter - Select your graphic card
Aspect Ratio - Your monitor aspect ratio
Resolution - Chose the resolution you want but remember that if you're getting low FPS, decreasing it you'll improve game performance (but the game will look blurry).
Antialiasing - It smoothes the game, making everything look sharper. If you disable it you'll get a huge FPS boost.
Anisotropic filtering - It doesn't affect the performance too much, if you got a good video card set it to 16 samples.
Windowed mode - Tick it to run the game in windowed mode. It might slow down the FPS on some systems.



Now, click on the Advanced... tab.
Texture Quality - Affects GPU, increase it if you got a good video card.
Radial Blur Quality - Affects GPU again, as before, increase it if you got a good video card or decrease it to gain some more FPS.
Shadow Detail - Affects both CPU and GPU, lowering this value will increase your FPS a lot.
Decal Quantity - Affects both CPU and GPU, as before, setting this to a lower value will increase your FPS but decrease the number of decals.
FXAA - If you don't use antialiasing but want to smooth the look of the game tick it, it won't be as heavy as the normal antialiasing.
Water:
Reflect Land, Trees, Objects and Sky. Unticking some of these values will increase your FPS but decrease the number of items reflected by the water.



Click on the View Distance tab.
Try setting these parameters to lower values, they will decrease the view distance but increase the FPS a lot.
Object Detail Fade - I suggest to untick it.

.ini Files configuration

In this section we'll talk about setting the .ini files, located in C:\Users\Username\Documents\MyGames\Skyrim\ in order to boost the whole game performance.

Open the Skyrim.ini file with notepad, there you'll find many commands/parameters. If the commands listed here aren't written in your files, simply add them. Before changing these files settings i strongly recommend making a backup of them (Skyrim.ini and SkyrimPrefs.ini).
List of commands:
\\ Skyrim.ini \\
uExterior Cell Buffer=#
#The number of exterior cells to be loaded. Decreasing this value will make the game use less ram. Set it to 36 if you got 1-2 GB of RAM, 72 if you got at least 2 GB of RAM, 108 if you got at least 4GB of RAM. If you set a higher value, the game will load faster. If you'd like to, you can choose a custom value (for example 12,24,36,48,60, and so on).
bReflectLODObjects=#
bReflectLODLand=#
bReflectSky=#
bReflectLODTrees=#
#These values are related to water reflection, set it to 0 to disable the ones you don't want or 1 to enable them. (Objects, Land, Sky and Trees are reflected).

Now it's time to open the SkyrimPrefs.ini file, using the notepad.
\\ SkyrimPrefs.ini \\
bDoDepthOfField=#
#This parameter enables the DoF (Deep of Field), disabling this will grant you some extra FPS. Set it to 0 to disable it, 1 to enable it.
bTreesReceiveShadows=#
bDrawLandShadows=#
#These commands will enable self-shadowing. Set them to 0 to disable them or to 1 to enable them. Disable them to improve game performance.
iRadialBlurLevel=#
#This adds an extra blur effect to the screen in certain situations, set it to a value between 0 and 10, 2 is the recommended value, 0 to disable it.
iBlurDeferredShadowMask=#
#Setting this parameter to a lower value will increase your FPS a bit and make the shadows look sharper, if you increase it they will look more blurry. Set it to a value between 0 and 3, 0 to disable it.
fShadowDistance=#
#This command will set the shadow distance. Set it to a value between 600.0000 and 8000.0000. Setting it to a lower value wil really improve your FPS but the shadows will render at a shorter distance.
iShadowMapResolutionSecondary=#
iShadowMapResolutionPrimary=#
#These are the shadows map resolution commands, set them to 512, 1024, 2048 or 4096. Mind that setting lower values will help game performance but will make the shadows look more pixelated. You don't have to set them to the same values, you can also set them to different ones, for example iShadowMapResolutionSecondary=1024 and iShadowMapResolutionPrimary=2048.
iShadowSplitCount=#
#Set it to a value between 1 and 4. I suggest you to set it to 2, setting higher values will slow down the game, while setting lower values will make the shadows look worse.
iShadowFilter=#
#Set it to a value between 1 and 4. Higher values = worse performance but better shadows, Lower values = better performance but worse shadows.
iTexMipMapSkip=#
#This value defines the texture size (rendered in long distance), Set it to 0,1 or 2. Lower value = better textures, higher = worse textures but more FPS.
iWaterMultiSamples=#
#This adds antialiasing to water, set it to a value between 0 and 8 (higher = max antialiasing). I suggest you to set it to 0 to improve your performance a lot.
bDrawShadows=#
#This parameter enables or disables shadows. 0 disables, 1 enabled. Disable them to get a good FPS boost.
iShadowMapResolution=#
#Shadows resolution, higher values will decrease game performance but improve them. Set it to 512,1024,2048 or 4096.
b30GrassVS=#
#Improves grass, 0 disabled, 1 enabled.
uiMaxSkinnedTreesToRender=#
#Set it to 10 to improve your game performance, 20 is the default value or 40 if you got a powerful computer.
uiMaxDecals=#
#The maximum number of decals. Set it to a value between 100 and 1000.
bDoHighDynamicRange=#
#Enables or disables HDR, 0 disabled, 1 enabled. Disable it to get more FPS.
iPresentInterval=#
#Enables or disables vsync. 0 disabled, 1 enabled.

Optional - Mouse Acceleration:
bMouseAcceleration=#
#Set it to 0 to disable mouse acceleration or 1 to enable it.

Suggestions

You'd better download Fraps and run it before adjusting your settings, to see which config gives you more FPS and update your video drivers.
It's recommended that you put TESV.exe in high priority mode, so the system will leave all of its CPU power to it. You can do it by starting Skyrim, when you're in the main menu press Ctrl+Alt+Del, open the Task Manager, there go to Details (Windows 8) or Processes (Windows 7-Vista), scroll down until you find TESV.exe, right click on it, Set priority, click on High and then choose Change priority. (Note: this is not suggested for old systems)
Also if you still don't get enough FPS or the games is not smooth, you can search the web for Skyrim Fps mods, this kind of mods will grant you a good fps boost.

Tested on:
Amd Phenom II X4 965 @3,4 Ghz - OC to 3,9 Ghz
Nvidia Gtx 560 non-ti 1024 mb of vram @ OC 950 Mhz
8GB ram @ 1333Mhz
Windows 8.1 64bit

Conclusion

Thank you for reading my guide, i hope it helped you to get a better gaming experience. For any questions or suggestions, post a comment below or add me. Remember to rate it!

Check the game i'm developing! http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=679194164

Do you play DayZ? Be sure to check out my FPS increasing guide about it! Click here!

If you want to become a fan or follow me click here.
Also check out my other workshop items if you want.

[✪ SwaG]

any idea about bugged quests (unmarked on radar)

[mimiko857]

Thank you very much for this simple information on game optimization forgive me if im not very good at computers but this guide really helped me a lot in giving more fps and the best part is the game looks very clean now without all these dark gotham city or any evil lair shadow features for buildings,etc. the old option even in whiterun its so very dark its like im in a dark alley. Again thanks for this guide !

[Black Arachnia]

thankyou this really helps especally my pc gtx 1050ti i5 quad core

[ryanbunn1]

so i have a GTX 1050 in my laptop and everything seems fine...for a little bit, after running around for a few seconds my fps starts tanking and gets really laggy. I am using a 55 inch monitor and wondering if thats the issue. i remember playing the game with a solid 60/70 fps range with close to 100 mods. Is it my monitor? I dont understand it

[Goku (Mid)]

actually worked thank you

[DwightPizza]

My laptop spec is core i5 - 6200U 2.3ghz up to 2.8ghz. Ram 8gb ddr4. Gpu gt940mx 2gb. For the 1st time i didnt trust my spec to stay at 60fps on medium. But i just run it on Ultra but ofcourse disable the Anisotropic and Anti Aliasing, and yeah im amaze i can run it smooth at 60fps, maybe down to 50 at very crowded area

[TheRetroGuy]

lol my computer had 4gb ram and 2.4ghz dual processor and im trying to get skyrim to work. I know this is a horrible idea and it will (literally) go down in flames but you know skyrim is a good game okay

[ErrantOverflow]

Hey! I bought skyrim a while ago and finally started to play the game. Before using this guide, I had an average of 20-30 fps, and after some minor tweaking, I got that juicy stable 60 fps!

I am trully gratefull, and wish you a nice day sir!

[jefferygalusha0]

i am having a framerate issue can anyone please help my computer has all the specs to run the game but every few seconds the games framerate skips i cant even play the game because the framerate is so horrible please anyone i love skyrim and i need a fix i have the unnofficable patches mods installed i was hoping they would fix it but the framerate is still horrible

[mindhost]

i got a 20+ fps boost, very nice guide!