The Last of Us Part I FPS Calculator & System Requirements

The Last of Us Part I beautifully remakes a classic narrative journey with stunning post-apocalyptic environments and incredibly lifelike character animations. To run the game your PC must reach a CPU performance score of at least 70 and a GPU score of at least 66. As a visually intensive title, The Last of Us Part I rewards hardware above the recommended threshold — particularly for ray tracing, high-resolution shadow maps, and ambient occlusion. At the recommended tier (CPU 84, GPU 82) expect around 75 FPS at 1080p on high settings. Enter your CPU and GPU in our calculator for a personalized estimate.

The Last of Us Part I lists these minimum specifications: CPU — AMD Ryzen 5 1500X or Intel Core i7-4770K; GPU — AMD Radeon RX 470 / NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970; RAM — 16 GB RAM; Storage — 100 GB available space; OS — Windows 10 (Version 1909 or Newer). At the minimum tier, expect the game to run at low or medium presets with frame rates around 30 FPS at 1080p. Demanding scenes — dense environments, complex lighting, or heavy particle effects — may dip below this. Disabling ray tracing and lowering shadow quality deliver the highest performance recovery on minimum-spec hardware.

For the best The Last of Us Part I experience, the recommended specifications are: CPU — AMD Ryzen 5 3600X or Intel Core i7-8700; GPU — AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT / NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER; RAM — 16 GB RAM; Storage — 100 GB available space. This hardware level targets smooth 75 FPS at 1080p on high settings with stable frame times. Enabling ray tracing, high-resolution shadow maps, and ambient occlusion simultaneously calls for a GPU above the recommended tier. If you are targeting 1440p on ultra presets, check our FPS calculator for the exact scores required.

On hardware meeting The Last of Us Part I's recommended specifications, expect around 75 FPS at 1080p on high settings. Enabling ray tracing, ultra shadow resolution, or screen-space ambient occlusion can reduce that figure by 15–30% depending on your GPU. Minimum-spec hardware typically achieves 25–40 FPS at 1080p on low-to-medium presets. Moving to 1440p costs roughly 30% of your 1080p frame rate, and 4K approximately 50–60%. Enter your exact hardware in our FPS calculator for a personalized estimate across every quality preset.

For high graphics settings in The Last of Us Part I at 1080p, your GPU needs a performance score of at least 82. The officially recommended card is AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT / NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER, which targets 75 FPS at 1080p. Enabling ray tracing on top of high settings demands significantly more GPU headroom — plan for a score well above 82 if RT is a priority. For 1440p on high settings, a GPU scoring around 107 or better is advisable. The FPS calculator lists every compatible GPU ranked by expected performance for this title.

The Last of Us Part I requires a CPU with a minimum performance score of 70 — roughly the level of AMD Ryzen 5 1500X or Intel Core i7-4770K or better. For a smooth experience without CPU bottlenecks, target the recommended score of 84 (around AMD Ryzen 5 3600X or Intel Core i7-8700). As a graphically rich title, it can stress the CPU in densely populated areas, complex physics sequences, or large set-piece moments. A CPU at the recommended score paired with 16 GB RAM ensures the processor does not throttle your GPU's potential output in those scenarios.

At 1440p, expect roughly 25–35% lower frame rates than 1080p in The Last of Us Part I. On hardware at the recommended tier (GPU score 82), this translates to around 53 FPS on high settings. To maintain 75+ FPS at 1440p, target a GPU scoring around 107 or higher. Use the FPS calculator above to get a precise estimate for your specific CPU and GPU combination at 1440p across every quality preset.

4K demands roughly 55–65% more GPU power than 1080p in The Last of Us Part I. On the recommended GPU (score 82), expect around 32 FPS at 4K on high settings. Reaching a consistent 75 FPS at 4K requires a GPU scoring around 135 or better. Upscaling technologies like DLSS 3 or FSR 3 can recover 40–60% of the resolution overhead with minimal visual cost on supported hardware.

The Last of Us Part I launched in March 2023 with one of the most troubled PC ports in recent memory — widespread shader compilation stutters, VRAM overallocation crashes, and CPU bottleneck issues affected the vast majority of players regardless of hardware tier. Naughty Dog and Iron Galaxy released over a dozen patches in the months following launch that significantly improved shader pre-compilation, reduced VRAM usage, and fixed NPC streaming hitches. As of late 2023 the game was in a substantially better state, though it remains more demanding than its quality tier would suggest — the recommended GPU score of 88 is high relative to the graphical output. Installing the latest patch before playing is essential.

Post-patch, the minimum PC requirements for stable play in The Last of Us Part I are: CPU — Intel Core i7-8700 or AMD Ryzen 5 3600; GPU — GeForce GTX 1070 8 GB or RX 5700 XT; RAM — 16 GB (the game is notably RAM-hungry, and 8 GB systems see more hitches); Storage — 100 GB SSD. The game's shader pre-compilation screen at launch must be allowed to complete fully — interrupting it causes in-game stutter on first load. If crashes persist after patching, verifying game files via Steam and clearing the shader cache folder (`%localappdata%\Naughty Dog\TheLasOfUs`) resolves most post-patch instability reports.