If you're just starting out in Gielinor for the first time, or a returning player coming back after yet another hiatus (it happens to us all), finding the best Old School Runescape settings can be quite tricky, especially with multiple launchers and a wealth of plug-ins to choose from. We're going to focus on the ideal setup for anyone looking to make OSRS look the best it ever has in the RuneLite launcher.
You're never going to need one of the best graphics card picks from our buying guide to run a game like Old School Runescape, but it can still be quite tricky to find the right settings to use. This is because there is no one right way to play the game, but we've found a few ways to improve the graphical quality of the game without sacrificing performance.
Best Old School Runescape graphics plugin
If you want to give Old School Runescape a graphical update while staying true to the throwback graphical style, you need to download 117 HD.
This plugin allows you to increase the draw distance, lighting quality, texture quality, frame rate, and even introduces skybox options that can change with the seasons or time of day. All in all, if you're someone who enjoys playing Old School Runescape as a full-screen experience, 117 HD is the ultimate plugin for making OSRS look fantastic across all resolutions up to 4K, but still keeping true to the retro feel of the game.
Best Old School Runescape settings
Within 117 HD, you can access a ton of additional graphics settings for OSRS, and here's the configuration we currently use:
- Draw Distance: 184
- Extended Map Loading: 5
- Anti-Aliasing: MSAA x16
- UI Scaling Mode: Bilinear
- Anisotropic Filtering: 16
- Unlock FPS: Yes
- VSync: On
- FPS Target: Set to maximum monitor refresh rate
- Color Blindness: None
- Dynamic Lights: Many (100)
- Projectile Lights: On
- NPC Lights: On
- Atmospheric Lighting: On
- Shadows: Detailed:
- Shadow Transparency: On
- Shadow Quality: High(4K)
- Shadow Distance: 90
- Expand Shadow Draw: On
- Vanilla Shadows: Show in PvM
- Normal Mapping: On
- Parallax Occlusion Mapping: On
- Seasonal Theme: Automatic
- Fog Depth Mode: Dynamic
- Static Fog Depth: 10
- Ground Fog: On
- Default Sky: 117 HD Blue
- Override Sky Color: No
- Model Textures: On
- Ground Textures: On
- Texture Resolution: 256
- Ground Blending: On
- Underwater Caustics: On
- HD TzHaar Reskin: On
- Model Caching: On
- Cache Size: 512
- Model Batching: On
As you can see in the image below, the difference between using 117 HD and sticking to the OG graphics is huge, and with modern gaming PCs having more than enough horsepower to handle these upgrades, you don't have to worry about the game being slowed down just because the graphics are being tinkered with.
How we tested Old School Runescape
At PCGamesN, we use dedicated gaming rigs to test the best settings for performance and gameplay in the latest releases. The test rig used to play Old School Runescape includes the following components: Intel Core i7-11700F, Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 12GB, 32GB of DDR4 3,200MHz RAM in dual-channel configuration, and an MSI B560 motherboard. We also test using Windows 11 64-bit.
We always run our testing first at 1,920 x 1,080 to identify the best settings for this entry-level resolution, then again at 2,560 x 1,440 using the same setup to gauge the difference in performance. Finally, we also test in 4K. We use CapFrameX to capture frame data and compare testing sessions.
Does Old School Runescape need an SSD?
Old School Runescape does not require the use of an SSD, as per the system requirements. The game can be downloaded and booted from a traditional HDD, and there are fairly minor benefits to using an SSD compared to other 3D games.
If you grab yourself the best gaming SSD from our buying guide, though, it will really help keep any in-game loading times in check while also providing some minor performance boosts for a wealth of other, more modern, 3D games.
How to monitor performance in Old School Runescape
If you want to keep an eye on performance in Old School Runescape, we have an easy method that works whether you're using an Nvidia or AMD graphics card.
For Nvidia cards, ensure you have the Nvidia App installed and the in-game overlay enabled, and then hit ALT + R in-game to bring up your performance monitor. With AMD cards, you can enable performance monitoring via the Radeon overlay using the shortcut CTRL + SHIFT + O.
Alternatively, you can download free software such as CapFrameX or Nvidia FrameView, to get a cleaner, more simplified benchmarking tool that works with any graphics card.
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