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Cities Skylines 2 Performance Issues Settings
Image: Colossal Order / Paradox Interactive

The Best Cities: Skylines 2 Settings to Help Fix Performance Issues

Cities: Skylines 2 is experiencing problems at launch, and nobody can deny it; the game heaps on increasingly taxing features, and it can slow your experience down a lot. When considering your best options, you should consider the following settings to fix performance issues in Cities: Skylines 2!

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It might be tempting to say something along the lines of “You just need a better rig” but the truth is the game has yet to be fully optimized. Until then, here are some options you can take to do it for yourself.

Try These 7 Settings in Cities: Skylines 2 If You’re Having Performance Issues

The first settings change you should make in Cities: Skylines 2 is in the Options menu under ‘General’ where you can change your performance preference to ‘Framerate.’ Beyond this, there are several options in the ‘Graphics’ section you can consider to optimize your experience including:

  • Lower ‘Level of Detail’ to Very Low
  • Turn off ‘Motion Blur’
  • Disable ‘Volumetrics Quality’
  • Disable ‘Depth of Field Mode’
  • Toggle between ‘Windowed’ or ‘Fullscreen’
  • Lower ‘Shadow Quality’

Related: How to Grow Your City Population in Cities: Skylines 2

In general, your city’s level of detail isn’t affected too much unless you’re looking extra close at all times. Several factors cause these performance issues, but they ultimately come down to graphics and the nature of the game itself.

When Do Performance Issues Appear the Most Often?

Typically, I encountered these more often at nighttime, where the combined motion blur and level of detail along with lighting could potentially turn the game into a slideshow.

How-to-Toggle-UI-and-Use-Photo-Mode-for-Screenshots-in-Cities-Skylines-2
Image: Attack of the Fanboy

Others have noted the game hitting certain milestones when the issues hit, namely when your population hit 10,000, then 25-30,000, where the issues became more pronounced. The above fixes will help mitigate this, but ultimately it’s down to the developers, as we’ve been aware of this since before launch.


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Author
Image of J.R. Waugh
J.R. Waugh
J.R. is a Staff Writer with AOTF and has been covering gaming and entertainment in the industry since 2022. Along with a B.A. in History from the University of Cincinnati, he has studied at the University of Birmingham, UK, and part of his M.A. at the University of Waterloo. You'll find J.R. particularly at home writing about the hottest manga and anime. He is highly passionate about horror, strategy, and RPGs, and anything about Star Trek or LOTR. When not ranting about fan theories or writing guides, J.R. is streaming his favorite RPGs and other forgotten gems.