If you want your games to look good, you might think your only option is to upgrade your PC. However, there are software solutions that can get the job done, and this free AMD tool might be just what you're looking for.
What is AMD FSR?
AMD FSR or FidelityFX Super Resolution uses open upscaling and frame binning to help increase in-game FPS while maintaining or even improving graphics quality. You can enable this feature in the graphics settings of games that support this feature.
FSR is AMD's answer to Nvidia DLSS. However, while both technologies upgrade games and help increase FPS, they work very differently.
Both FSR and DLSS render the game at a lower native resolution to make it easier for the PC to run, then upscale before the game reaches the screen for higher fidelity. As for the FPS boost feature, they automatically detect when the game skips frames and uses an image interpolation algorithm to fill in the gaps. This results in a significant increase in performance and image quality at the cost of a little GPU space.

AMD's FSR uses a spatial upscaling algorithm to take lower resolution graphics and upscale them to be more visually appealing. The technology is also open source, meaning it's easier to integrate into games and runs on more GPUs, unlike DLSS.
FSR has gone through 4 generations since its release in 2021. Depending on the version of FSR you are using (1, 2, 3 or 3.1), the final result will be different. Framing is also a fairly new concept for FSR, which was recently released as FSR 3. AMD introduced FSR 4 with a lot of AI features.
So how does FSR provide performance improvements? According to AMD, you can combine upscaling and framerates to get 3.3x higher frame rates on a Radeon RX 7000 series GPU when gaming at 4K or 1440p resolution.
Games like Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, Ghost of Tsushima Director's Cut, and The Last of Us Part I offer 3x more FPS than you can achieve at maximum graphics settings with the combination of FSR and GPU Radeon RX 7000 series.
Actual performance will vary depending on PC configuration, especially GPU. However, you can still expect significant performance gains when using FSR's upscaling and imaging capabilities.
Which GPUs does this technology work on?
Because FSR is an open source technology, it works on both AMD and Nvidia GPUs – unlike DLSS, which is exclusive to Nvidia hardware. Here's a quick chart showing supported and recommended graphics hardware for FSR 3 and 2.
|
FSR 3 with Upscaling + Advanced Frame Generation feature |
FSR 3 with Upscaling feature |
FSR 2 |
---|---|---|---|
Encourage |
AMD Radeon RX 6000 Series graphics or higher |
AMD Radeon RX 5000 Series graphics or higher |
AMD Radeon RX 5000 Series graphics or higher |
Supported |
AMD Radeon RX 5000 Series graphics or higher |
AMD Radeon RX 500 Series graphics or higher |
AMD Radeon RX 500 Series graphics or higher |
Additionally, although FSR 3 and 2 are optimized to work with dedicated graphics cards, they can still be used with some Ryzen processors that come with AMD's Radeon integrated graphics.
How to use AMD FSR to upgrade games
Using FSR is a simple matter of turning on the setting in whatever game you're playing. Keep in mind that the game needs to have FSR support for you to be able to use this tool, so it won't be available in every game.
Luckily, that list of supported games is quite long, with over 100 games supported across FSR versions. You can check out the FSR supported games page on AMD's website for detailed information. New games are also constantly added to the list, so chances are the game you want to play will be supported.

In case a game doesn't support AMD FSR, you can still use something called Radeon Super Resolution or RSR to upscale almost any game you want. This technology is based on FSR 1 and can work in any proprietary full-screen game without the need for the game developer to add any supporting software. The only downside is that you need at least an AMD 5000 series GPU to run it as this feature is part of the AMD graphics driver and can only run on AMD GPUs.
However, FSR won't magically make every game better, as the PC hardware still has to do all the heavy lifting. When trying to play Hellblade 2, the test laptop struggled to surpass 20FPS even with the graphics settings turned down to the lowest possible level and FSR running at full capacity.
Different games also react differently to FSR interference, meaning your performance will vary. For example, while Forza Horizon 5 and Warframe ran well over 60 FPS with respectable graphics, Warzone and Ghost of Tsushima were a bit overkill, with random bugs popping up.