Best Shadow of Erdtree graphics settings for high or low PC

The Shadow of Erdtree expansion for Elden Ring brings new areas to explore, bosses to defeat, and plenty of stunning visuals. However, with the large amount of graphical options available, it can be a challenge to find the best settings to balance visual fidelity and performance, especially if you're playing on a PC. Whether you're running a high-end gaming rig or dealing with a more modest setup, we've got you covered with the optimal graphics settings for both high and low-end systems.

Graphics Settings Overview

Elden Ring's expansive graphics settings menu offers a lot of customization, but understanding which settings to prioritize based on your hardware can make a significant difference in both performance and visual quality. Let’s break down the settings for both high-end and low-end PCs.


Best Settings for High-End PC

If you're lucky enough to have a powerful gaming PC, you don’t have to worry too much about performance—though tweaking the settings can still improve your experience. Here are the recommended settings for a high-end system to enjoy Elden Ring: Shadow of Erdtree in all its graphical glory.

System - Graphics - Display

  • Screen Mode: Fullscreen
    Maximizes your performance by dedicating the display to the game.
  • Resolution: Native
    Run at the highest resolution your monitor supports for the best visual experience.
  • Auto-Detect Best Rendering Settings: Off
    Turn this off to manually adjust the settings for maximum performance and quality.
  • Ray Tracing Quality: Off
    Ray tracing can hit performance hard, and it's best to keep it off unless you have a top-tier GPU.
  • Quality Settings: Maximum
    Set this to the highest setting to maximize the visual quality.

Advanced Settings

  • Texture Quality: Maximum
    If you have a powerful GPU and ample VRAM, setting texture quality to max will provide the sharpest, most detailed textures.
  • Antialiasing Quality: High
    High-quality antialiasing smooths out jagged edges without significantly affecting performance.
  • SSAO (Screen Space Ambient Occlusion): Maximum
    Enabling the highest SSAO setting adds more depth and realism to lighting, shadows, and environment detail.
  • Depth Of Field: Off
    Disabling this can help with performance, as it can be demanding during fast movement.
  • Motion Blur: Off
    Motion blur can often detract from clarity and is a common setting to turn off for higher FPS.
  • Shadow Quality: Maximum
    Shadows play a huge role in visual realism, and at max, they look fantastic.
  • Lighting Quality: Maximum
    This setting enhances how lighting behaves in the game world, crucial for a stunning visual experience.
  • Effects Quality: Maximum
    Set this to max to make sure explosions, magic effects, and other visual details are as spectacular as possible.
  • Volumetric Quality: Maximum
    This improves fog, smoke, and light scattering, which enhances environmental immersion.
  • Reflection Quality: Maximum
    Crank up the reflections for sharper and more realistic mirrors, puddles, and reflective surfaces.
  • Water Surface Quality: High
    Water reflections and effects are vital in a game like Elden Ring, and setting this to high will make rivers, lakes, and oceans stand out.
  • Shader Quality: High
    Setting shaders to high will ensure that lighting, shadows, and surface interactions look as realistic as possible.
  • Global Illumination Quality: High
    This improves how light interacts with the world, enhancing the atmosphere and realism.
  • Grass Quality: Maximum
    Maximum grass quality brings beautiful environmental detail to the expansive open world.

Best Graphics Settings, Shadow of Erdtree, PC Game
Best Settings for Medium to Low-End PC

For players using lower-end or older PCs, performance becomes more of a concern. You’ll want to prioritize settings that offer the best visual quality without sacrificing too many frames per second. Here’s a recommended custom configuration to achieve a balanced experience.

System - Graphics - Display

  • Screen Mode: Fullscreen
    This will help improve performance over windowed modes.
  • Resolution: Native
    Stick to your monitor’s native resolution to maintain image clarity.
  • Auto-Detect Best Rendering Settings: Off
    Manually adjusting your settings gives you better control over performance.
  • Ray Tracing Quality: Off
    Ray tracing is highly demanding on hardware, so it's best to leave this off on lower-end PCs.
  • Quality Settings: Custom
    Choose custom settings to optimize both performance and visual quality.

Advanced Settings

  • Texture Quality: High
    A high setting will ensure that the textures still look good, but it won’t tax your system too heavily.
  • Antialiasing Quality: High
    Antialiasing smooths out edges and can help reduce jaggedness without hitting performance too hard.
  • SSAO (Screen Space Ambient Occlusion): Medium
    Set SSAO to medium to get a good balance between quality and performance.
  • Depth Of Field: Off
    Disabling depth of field improves clarity and performance, especially during fast movement.
  • Motion Blur: Off
    Motion blur often detracts from clarity, and it’s better to disable it to keep frames high.
  • Shadow Quality: High
    Shadows are essential for immersion, and setting them to high ensures they look good without a huge performance hit.
  • Lighting Quality: Medium / Low
    Depending on your system’s capabilities, reduce lighting quality to medium or low to improve performance.
  • Effects Quality: Low
    Reducing effects quality will lower the strain on your system during large explosions and spells.
  • Volumetric Quality: High
    Volumetric effects like fog and smoke are stunning and can still look good at a high setting without a huge performance cost.
  • Reflection Quality: High
    Reflections enhance immersion, but setting this to high will ensure your system doesn’t struggle too much.
  • Water Surface Quality: Low
    Water effects can be taxing on lower-end systems, so reducing this setting helps boost performance.
  • Shader Quality: High
    High shaders will give you good visual fidelity without overwhelming your system.
  • Global Illumination Quality: Low
    Global illumination can be demanding, so keeping this at low will preserve your frames per second.
  • Grass Quality: High
    Grass quality impacts performance less than other settings, so you can keep it high without significant loss in FPS.

Conclusion

Whether you're wielding a beast of a PC or playing on a budget setup, Elden Ring: Shadow of Erdtree offers an immense graphical experience that can be tailored to your hardware. For high-end systems, maxing out settings is the way to go, ensuring you experience every detail of this visually rich world. For lower-end PCs, optimizing your settings by lowering certain features like shadows and lighting will keep your frame rate smooth without sacrificing too much visual fidelity.

By following these settings, you'll be able to enjoy the expansive world of Shadow of Erdtree while maintaining a solid performance. Happy adventuring!

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