We must establish a baseline FPS number. How do we know if we are improving otherwise?

We will run a TF2 benchmark.

https://docs.mastercomfig.com/latest/benchmarks/ and click on benchmark file [mastercoms credit]

All your results are stored in your TF2 install folder in a file called "sourcebench.csv"
This is basically a text file we can open with Notepad to read our results. Important values are average fps and the variability. We want high average FPS numbers with low variability.

Run this at every step so we can see how much we improve by.

Ok, lets begin

The best FPS config at the moment is mastercomfig by mastercoms. It is very good, easy to modify, and is updated regularly.

Here is a download link for the best version of the config:
https://mastercomfig.com

Choose low or very low for the best performance. Very low should be used only if you are desperate.

Install guide:
https://docs.mastercomfig.com/latest/setup/clean_up/

I would suggest downloading that one, but if that doesn't work for you, comangliacoms also has given me good results.

https://github.com/Comanglia/ComangliaComs

[By Comanglia]

These have worked well for me in my testing. If they don't play nice with your system try something else. There are plenty of configs available, but these two are the most well regarded.

If you like mastercoms' work, donate to her! She provides a great resource and config for us all for free. Show her support so the website, wiki and config stay online and updated!

https://docs.mastercomfig.com/9.6.3/support_me/

From my testing, I got 25% performance just by using the "low" preset. In other systems I tested previously, I could get 35-40%! Considering these configs help in other ways, like networking tweaks, these are a must have.

HUDs (or heads up display) is the UI that shows your health, ammo and other gameplay stuff while you are in game.

Surprisingly, if you have a custom, community-made HUD that has simpler elements, it can boost your FPS.

I used LightHUD, a HUD that claims to boost FPS. And over the normal TF2 HUD, I gained 2.7% performance! The simpler the HUD, the more FPS you get!

Have a look for different HUDs here: https://comfig.app/huds/1/

(Also by mastercoms, seriously consider donating to her)

There is a lot of misleading information here so I will be short and direct to the point:


For more VALID launch options, check out the mastercomfig wiki:
https://docs.mastercomfig.com/latest/customization/launch_options/

On my Ryzen 5 2600X based system I went from 280fps to 295fps just by changing dxlevel 95 to 81, a 5% increase!

Here are things to avoid:
https://docs.mastercomfig.com/latest/tf2/misconceptions/

Here are some launch options THAT DO NOTHING. DO NOT USE THESE:
-noipx DOES NOTHING.
-heapsize DOES NOTHING.
-nod3d9ex HAS BEEN REMOVED SO DOES NOTHING
-threads NEGATIVELY IMPACTS PERFORMANCE. USE CORE AFFINITIES INSTEAD

Perhaps not surprisingly, all the hats and extra models in the game lowers your FPS by a noticeable amount. If you want more performance, why not disable all hats in the game? Well it just so happens that someone had that idea!

A user on the TFTV forum, JarateKing, has created a command line utility called CleanTF2+, which allows you to remove some features from the game, like hats and unnecessary sounds, or even simplify textures. This can de-clutter the game, improving gameplay and visibility, and FPS! A win win!

Check it out here:
https://www.teamfortress.tv/51736/cleantf2-nohats-flat-textures-etc

Installation instructions:
https://github.com/JarateKing/CleanTF2plus/blob/master/README.md

Basically, unzip the folder in your "custom" in your C:/Program Files(x86)/Steam/steamapps/common/Team Fortress 2/tf folder. Run generate.bat in cmd.exe and select what you want and you're done!

I saw anywhere from 2 to 10% FPS improvement by enabling this mod, and it works on valve casual! Well worth it if you don't care about hats.

There are some more mods and console commands we can put into the game to get extra fps.

What is a "match hud"? Basically, its the thing at the top of the screen that shows who is alive and your team health. This is rendered inefficiently in-game, so it reduces your performance a lot. In my testing, it can be as much as 5% or even 10% loss of FPS. Crazy for a HUD element, and shows how unoptimized TF2 is.



In your TF2 console, type


This will disable that HUD element and give you fps. To renable it, simply change the 0 to a 1.

Viewmodels is basically the gun your are holding being rendered on your screen.

Remember, any extra models, lighting or rendering will reduce your FPS. The viewmodel is one of them, so removing them can boost our FPS!

To disable, in the developer console type:

Now your gun won't be on screen. Most competitive TF2 players hide their view model to improve visibility, so it might be a gameplay advantage also.

If there are more 3D objects on the screen, thats more lighting, polygons and textures to render.
Though a major gameplay advantage to spies, its better to be toggled on when needed and not kept on all the time as it serves little to no gameplay purpose.

I didn't know minecraft was in tf2!!!

But you can activate a low resolution mode in TF2. In your console type


to reduce the resolution. This can help on low end GPUs. Tweak this value until you get what you want, but its likely that it won't help. But you never know!

Your resolution is the screen size your game is rendered at. For example, 1080p, 1280x720, 1366x768, etc.

Lowering your resolution can help a ton if your GPU is bad. Less pixels that need to be rendered will result in extra performance!


But here's a little known secret. Even if you have a RTX Roomheater 5000:

Changing your aspect ratio to 4:3 will boost your FPS? The FOV you have ingame is based upon a 4:3 aspect ratio. If you are using 16:9, like at 1080p, your FOV is actually 110!

Remember, the more stuff that needs to be rendered, the lower the FPS.


Credit: skybert88 on reddit

This could be a HUGE gameplay advantage (as you can see more of the game), but it also eats a sizeable amount of FPS, around 5% in my testing. If you want better frames per second, change the aspect ratio to 4:3 and lower your resolution.

For more scientific and mathy info read this:
https://www.teamfortress.tv/8532/a-guide-to-fov-in-tf2 [by Kerch on TFTV]

If you are running TF2 in a window, or windowed with no borders, you could be eating into your FPS, and more importantly your gameplay.

If you are on Windows 8, 10 or 11 and you are in a window, V-Sync is actually on. This is because the DWM (Desktop Window Manager) forces vsync on all programs, UNLESS they are in fullscreen mode.

This means your input lag will be higher, and the game will feel less responsive. Use fullscreen mode for better aiming!

There may be some new drivers that improve performance. Be aware that some updates may affect this. For example, AMD crimson 19.7.1 and 19.7.2 drivers worsen fps a lot. Always exercise caution and if you're happy, don't change anything.

Go to C:/Program Files(x86)/Steam/steamapps/common/Team Fortress 2 or where your TF2 is installed

Right click hl2.exe and go to properties

-> compatability tab
-> disable full screen optimisations CHECKED


Also we can override scaling and make it performed by the application. This can help on laptops from my experience.


These settings will give a 1-3% fps boost


Disabling privacy invading options are always a good thing and may increase your FPS marginally.

I recommend using W10Privacy to disable them as it has a lot of options that you cant access in system settings.
Remember:
Create a restore point
Read what all settings do and consider them carefully



Some people report that disabling game mode, Xbox DVR and the gamebar improves their FPS.

Follow this guide on how to disable the game bar and game mode.
https://www.askvg.com/tip-how-to-disable-game-mode-and-game-bar-in-windows-10/

Follow this to completely disable Game DVR:
https://www.top-password.com/blog/disable-game-bar-and-game-dvr-in-windows-10/

And if you're adventurous you can remove all Xbox apps, but i don't suggest doing that.


Some services are running in the background. Some are critical to Windows working right and some are not needed. Some can be safely disabled. CREATE A RESTORE POINT BEFORE DOING THIS.

Press the windows key and the 'R' key at the same time or search for "run"

Type in MSCONFIG

Click services

First hide all Microsoft services.
Uncheck any unneeded services. Google services you don't recognise or know what they do



Then if you are feeling adventurous and advanced, you can start to disable some of the Microsoft services you don't need. Heres a safe one you can probably disable: Fax. I doubt any of you send faxes anymore.


Don't be silly and disable Windows Audio or any critical windows services. If you don't know 100% what you are doing, don't.

Right click on the taskbar, and open task manager. Go to the details tab. Look for any running applications that you don't need. Sort by CPU usage by clicking on the CPU column at the top



Rule of thumb: if you don't know what it is, don't end the process. Google is your friend.

You may have malware (malicious software like viruses) that are not only causing harm to your PC, but slowing it down also. Do a virus scan with Windows Defender, and if you still suspect you have a virus, i'd suggest downloading Malwarebytes, as they are reputable and have a high detection rate. Removing viruses can help boost your FPS a lot.

The Desktop Window Manager (DWM) is a program on every PC since Windows Vista. It allows for pretty effects.

One large downside is that if you want to run windowed mode, it reduces your frame rates by a lot and also forces V-sync on, creating a large input delay.

An easy way to disable it is to enable the classic theme.

Right click the desktop and go to personalize.
Choose classic theme

Done! It should be disabled.

If this for some reason does not work for you, you can safely disable the DWM service from starting in services.msc.

Over the years Steam has gotten more and more bloated, and disabling some features can free up some CPU cycles for your game.

Especially if you alt-tab frequently, the in-game overlay can cause stutters, FPS drops and inconsistent performance. Disable this for better consistency.

Steam => Settings => In-game


Also, use Low performance mode and if possible, close your friends list. These have been reported to also cause stutters while in-game.

Back in 2007, hyper threading technology (Or SMT for AMD users) wasn't really around in any real capacity for any processor. Funnily enough TF2 was released in 2007, so the engine was not made to take advantage of multiple cores or hyperthreaded cores. Of course in time it gained multicore support but not really by todays standards.

From my testing, TF2 will use a maximum of 3 cores. This can be good and bad. The bad thing is, windows is dumb, and won't efficiently put TF2 on the right cores.


There are some solutions. First of, if you have a quad core CPU or better, go into your BIOS. Search around on google on how to do this, but its normally f1, f12 or delete.

Then find under advanced or advanced CPU settings "Hyper-threading technology" or "Simultaneous Multi Threading". We want to disable this so that Windows always puts TF2 on a real core to maximise the performance.


Credit: Oracle Help Center


Now in task manager if you have say an i7 4790k, you will have 4 cpu boxes instead of 8, because we disabled the hyperthreading cores.

This will give about a 3-7% performance bump.

If you dont want to disable this, you can manually set core affinities in task manager.

Press CTRL+SHIFT+ESCAPE or go to Task Manager

Right click on hl2.exe and select "core affinity" on the details tab.



if you have 8 boxes, select core 2, 4, 6 for the best performance.

We are effectively telling windows not to use the first core at all and the non hyperthreaded cores.

Same applies to most other processors.
Golden rule: if you have 4 cores or more, do not put TF2 on core 0. Windows likes to use core 0 for everything generally.

If you have an AMD Ryzen CPU, you have CCXs. You want all your affinities to be on the same CCX + 1 on another CCX - my theory is that the extra cache on the other CCX reduces latency. Split the cores available in half, and there's your CCXs. Select 1 on the first CCX and the rest on the last CCX.

Your CPU or GPU might be throttling due to power or heat, which can reduce your FPS. To determine if you are throttling, you can download HWInfo64 and show graphs on any power/thermal limit reasons as well as your clock speed. This will allow you to determine if you are in fact throttling due to these reasons.

• Clean out vents, fans and heatsinks to ensure you have optimal airflow
  
• Replace thermal paste with a superior one.
  
  Thermal Grizzly Kyronaut is a good but expensive paste. Gelid GC Extreme, Noctua NT-H2, or even liquid metal pastes (not recommended) can improve temperatures by 2-10 degrees, depending on how bad your paste is
  
  
• Upgrade your heatsink/cooler if possible
  
• Under-volting (but you need to test stability if you do this)
  
• Limit the maximum power your CPU/GPU can use (throttling is WORSE than just running slower to begin with)

You can try undervolting your CPU or GPU which not only reduces temperatures but allows more power to go to your CPU/GPU. In the bios (vCore) use an offset voltage.

Increase the power limit.

Intel core i3/i5/i7/i9 CPU: Increase turbo boost sustained power in the BIOS or Intel Extreme Tuning Utility
AMD Ryzen CPU: Enable PBO and increase EDC, PPT, and TDC values in the BIOS or Ryzen master
AMD GPU: In radeon setttings or WattTool, increase power target
NVIDIA GPU: Increase power target in MSI Afterburner

Raising power targets can make your PC hotter. So if you are already at 80 Celcius, do not increase the power any more.

Increase airflow over VRMs
VRM stands for voltage regulator modules. These convert the high voltage power from the power supply down to 12, 5, 3.3 and 1.8 volts. If these get too hot, they wont work as hard and throttle themselves to keep them from failing prematurely. Have good airflow over this area and you won't VRM throttle. This situation is very rare and can explain why your clock speeds drop with no explanation.

VRMs are normally located near or next to your CPU, perhaps underneath some metal or plastic.
Metal is used so it can remove heat. If you put a fan there, it can cool off better.

Credit: Graphicscardhub.com

TF2 is based on a source engine, an engine released in 2004. At this time, GPUs were not as good so it put all the effects onto the CPU. This was good for the time, but now when GPUs are much more powerful than CPUs, this has made the game heavily dependant on the single thread performance of your CPU.

Basically, the more powerful your CPU is, the better (to a point)

Source Engine for TF2 only makes use of 3 to 4 cores at most. You don't want to buy an 8 core thinking you get more performance. It's all about IPC and clock speed, not cores.

You don't need a crazy CPU to run TF2. A Ryzen 5 2600 or a Ryzen 5 3600 will run TF2 very well. Anything around that performance level is what you should be targeting (or better).

For overclocking, make sure you have a good tower cooler, or at least a 240mm AIO Watercooler, so you dont overheat the CPU.

Here are some good guides to overclocking Intel platforms or Ryzen platforms:
https://www.reddit.com/r/overclocking/wiki/index

NOTE: Look at the safe voltages listed for your CPU on r/overclocking Wiki. If you go over that voltage you will "degrade" your CPU, meaning you will not be able to run your CPU as fast. Follow those guidelines carefully or risk damaging your processor.

With Ryzen 5000, you can use PBO to increase power limits and clock speed of your processor to allow it to boost higher. Using this with curve optimiser to effectively under-volt your CPU will pair nicely with this method.

Look in your PC if you can. If you cannot see at least 2 sticks of RAM in your system, you are leaving a LARGE amount of performance on the table. Dual channel operation is crucial to improving not only TF2 performance by a lot, but your whole system too.

Ideally for the most performance you want a Quad Rank configuration (2X2R), but having 2 sticks of RAM in dual channel will get you most of the performance.

This is not for the faint of heart. I will not be explaining RAM overclocking here as there are many guides on the internet.

Buildzoid from Actually Hardcore Overclocking on Youtube has a great guide for you to follow on RAM overclocking.

The lower latency and the faster your RAM is, the better it is for TF2 and any source engine game. It's almost as important for single threaded performance for TF2.

Overclocking RAM can be VERY COMPLICATED, and you can introduce weird system behaviour or instability that can be hard to detect. You must stability test your entire system for 12 hours or more to ensure you dont corrupt data in your RAM!

Some good RAM stability tests in Windows are MemTest64/AIDA64 system stability test and memtest86+ is a good reliable utility outside of Windows.

I don't suggest doing this and letting XMP or DOCP do its job on its own.

Heres a nice little table showing my results with moderate overclocking:

I would think a lot of people reading this are using a laptop. To increase performance on a laptop you can:

1) Ensure that if you have a dedicated graphics card that the laptop is using it in WIndows Settings
2) Fix overheating or power issues
3) Ensure we are at maximum performance possible

If you have a high end laptop or gaming laptop, you will have 2 GPUs. An integrated one and a dedicated one.

Integrated graphics are built into your CPU. They are very power efficient, but can be slow. So in general we want to use the powerful dedicated GPU (dGPU).

In windows, set your graphics driver preference to "maximum performance", and ensure you are selecting your dedicated GPU.

If you are an nVidia user, go to the nVidia control panel and set your preferred graphics processor to performance in 3D settings.

We can fix power and thermal issues by undervolting our CPU. Undervolting makes our CPU use less power while getting the same things done. This can cause system instability, so be sure to test with a stress test program, such as Blender, to ensure that we improve performance.

You can use Intel XTU or Throttlestop to undervolt.

4x00 CPU: -0.03v offset
5x00 CPU: -0.025v offset
6x00 CPU: -0.05v offset
7x00 CPU: -0.06v offset

This can allow your CPU to run cooler and stay turbo boosted for longer. We aren't overclocking when we do this.

Undervolting is 100% safe. You won't damage something by putting too little voltage through it.

Heres a guide to follow:
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-Extreme-Tuning-Utility-XTU-Undervolting-Guide.272120.0.html

Alternatively, follow steps in the thermal throttling section.

Unfortunately, AMD laptops using Ryzen chips cannot be undervolted. Some newer intel laptops also cannot be undervolted. Depends how lucky you are.

If you are still overheating, chances are your laptop manufacturer or a community contributor has made software to control your fans. More airflow = cooler system. Try increase the fan speed of your laptop to improve cooling.

Some laptops perform much worse on battery power compared to being plugged in. There are many reasons this could happen, but in general it tends to be BIOS issues or driver issues. Try updating your BIOS and drivers to ensure you get the latest fixes to any issues. If the issue still persists after updates, being plugged in is a sure fire way to get the most performance.

Additionally, you may be in a power saving power profile. Check power options in Windows and ensure you are at the "balanced" profile power plan, and any power saving features in modern Settings are disabled (power slider to the right)

We can overclock our integrated GPU if our GPU is limiting performance.
You require Intel XTU for intel iGPU overclocking or MSI afterburner for AMD integrated GPUs

Overclocking voids warranty and i wont be liable if you damage anything!

Adjust graphics frequency. It probably will be at 1050 or 1150MHz. Up this by 50 MHz until it starts going strange or crashing. 50Mhz increase can improve FPS by 2 or 5 depending on your setup.

You may not be able to increase this at all. Depends on your setup.

Faster DRAM can improve IGPU performance. Dual Channel DRAM can improve IGPU and CPU performance.

Who would have thought? Linux performs better than Windows for TF2!

Linux, especially if you have an integrated Intel or a dedicated AMD GPU, will most likely perform noticeably faster than Windows 10. I saw up to a 7% performance increase by using Manjaro Linux.

Install Lutris from the App Store, enable Feral Gamemode in the lutris options, and you will perform faster than Windows! Many people report the game feeling more responsive than Windows also.

Only drawback is that you cannot run DXlevel 81, which might eat into the 7% performance bump you get anyway. But, if you want DX 9 and skins but with more performance, use Linux! With the KDE desktop, it is as easy to use as Windows 10, and way better to customize! (like the good old days in Windows XP)

I would suggest following a guide from Linus Tech Tips, as their Linux content is very easy to watch.

You dont have to use Manjaro. Pop OS, Fedora or Linux Mint are good options if you want a more stable and user friendly experience.

There are some custom GPU drivers that have improved performance over the regular intel ones. I won't link them here because...

WARNING: I CANNOT VERIFY THESE DRIVERS MYSELF AND THEY MAY HAVE MALICIOUS PROGRAMS IN THEM THAT STEAL YOUR DATA. I CANNOT VOUCH FOR THEIR PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT OR SECURITY. DO NOT DO THIS UNLESS YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING.

However, I have used NimeZ drivers for AMD cards, and they might provide a nice boost for older HD 5000/6000 series cards or 7000/200/300 series cards. But I cannot guarantee that those modified drivers wont harm your system. Do at your own risk.

Not something we all want to hear, but if you have a trashtop or your dads Pentium 4 from 2005 it might be time for an upgrade. No matter how much tweaking, you may not be able to get enough extra performance out of your PC.

I would suggest 2nd Gen Ryzen as a minimum target, something like a Ryzen 5 2600.

Some other good options are:
Ryzen: 2600 or better, 3600 or better, 5600 or better, 7600X or better.
Intel: 12400 or better

Buy fast RAM.
DDR4: At least 3200MHz
DDR5: At least 5600MHz
Aim for low CAS timings.

TF2 doesnt care much about your GPU. A 750 ti would be adequate for 1080p. But I would suggest an RX 570 or 1060 6GB at a minimum, so you can at least attempt to play other games.

Don't forget other things, like your monitor and mouse. Buy a high refresh rate monitor, as it will make the game look smoother and more responsive. Once you go above 120Hz, you won't want to go back!

TF2 doesn't take much to run as long as you apply the optimizations in this guide. I have an ultrabook with a Ryzen 5800U in it, and at 1080p I can get over 300FPS in game. That's on integrated graphics on battery power!

But if you want a gaming laptop, get something with a 6 core CPU or better and a dedicated GPU, and you're laughing!

TLDR: any somewhat modern (ie last 5 years) AMD Ryzen or Intel Core processor and a decent GPU and you will be fine.

Mastercoms - For an excellent config thats updated and a good information resource on her wiki.
Comanglia - For creating the original comanglia config and updating it
JarateKing - For creating the CleanTF2+ program
meb - For creating the original TF2 benchmark all those years ago
Valve - for having a relatively unoptimised game with a bunch of clutter and hats in

All the awful FPS guides that exist that motivated me to make this one.

smiffy smells

Any suggestions to make this guide better are welcome in the comments :)