The Best CS:GO Launch Options: Step-By-Step

Did you know that the average CS:GO player has over 600 hours of playtime? If you’re someone that plays a lot, it might be worth optimizing your CS:GO launch options, as it can save you a lot of time in the long run.

We’re going to show exactly how the best CS:GO players optimize their launch options for the best experience in-game.

Image source: Steam

Best CS:GO Launch Options: Step-By-Step

To use the best CS:GO launch options, you must use Steam’s launch options to ensure they’re active each time you launch the game. If you click CS:GO on Steam and enter the ‘Properties’ menu, there will be a ‘Launch Options’ setting. That’s where we’ll enter the following commands.

• Under the Steam ‘Launch Options’, enter the command ‘+fps_max 0‘. You’ll only benefit from this if you have a high refresh rate monitor such as 120Hz or 144Hz, but for players who do, it’s an absolute necessity. It’s one of the best launch options for CS:GO, as the extra frame rate can be the difference between whether you kill an enemy or not. You’ll find this setting in most CS:GO pro settings, as at the top of the game players can’t afford low FPS.
• Enter the command ‘-novid‘. This removes the short Valve intro that plays when you launch the CS:GO. If you play most days, this short time can add up!
• If you usually play in windowed mode, enter the command ‘-fullscreen‘. By putting your game into fullscreen, it stops your PC from rendering other elements of the Windows UI, and allows CS:GO to use more resources. You should see an FPS boost from this.
• Use the command ‘-high‘. This makes CS:GO a higher priority, and your PC will allocate more resources to it. Again, you should see an FPS boost from this.
• Enter the command ‘+cl_forcepreload 1‘. This console command forces the game to preload models and textures prior to a game, rather than in it. This one is a trade-off. While maps will take longer to load, your FPS will improve as a result.
• If you play a lot of offline practice, consider using the ‘-tickrate 128‘ command. This ensures that information from your PC to the server in offline games is refreshed more often, and makes sure that you’re playing the most accurate version of the game possible. It’s frustrating to feel as though you hit a shot, but the server decided that you didn’t. It might be down to your tickrate, which can be fixed with this command.

If you’ve done it correctly, your CS:GO launch options in Steam should look like this:

                +fps_max 0 -novid -fullscreen -high +cl_forcepreload 1 -tickrate 128

You can copy and paste these into your Steam settings, for the easiest CS:GO launch settings possible. While there are more console commands that you can add to this list, we feel these are the essentials that most regular CS:GO players will need.

Prior to playing, there are other ways you can customize your CS:GO for the best possible gaming experience. For example, every player should look for the best CS:GO crosshair that suits how they play. It can massively improve your performance in-game, and you probably wouldn’t even realize it.