How to Reduce Input Lag in The Finals: Settings That Matter

To reduce input lag in The Finals, turn on NVIDIA Reflex Low Latency (On + Boost) or AMD Anti-Lag 2, play in Fullscreen with VSync off, leave Frame Generation off, and keep your GPU below full load by capping frames a few FPS under your refresh rate. Those four changes remove the render queue, which is where most avoidable delay hides. The rest of this guide explains each step, the order to apply them, and how to tell real input lag apart from network lag, because in The Finals the two are often confused.

Where the delay actually comes from

Input lag is the time between clicking your mouse and seeing the result on screen. It stacks up across several stages: the mouse reports the click, the CPU simulates the frame, the frame waits in a queue, the GPU renders it, and the monitor scans it out. You cannot remove every stage, but you can shrink the ones that are configurable.

The biggest variable is the render queue. When your GPU sits at 99% usage, the CPU runs ahead and prepares frames that wait their turn. Each waiting frame adds roughly one full frame time of delay. The arithmetic is simple: at 100 FPS one frame takes 10 ms, so a queue of two frames adds around 20 ms before your click even begins rendering. That is why a PC showing a high FPS counter can still feel sluggish.

These are illustrative figures from frame-time math, not measurements of a specific system. The pattern is what matters: the lower your frame rate, the more each queued frame costs you.

Step-by-step: the settings that lower input lag

1. Enable Reflex or Anti-Lag 2

In the Video settings, set NVIDIA Reflex Low Latency to On + Boost on a GeForce card. Reflex keeps the CPU from running ahead of the GPU, so frames are rendered “just in time” instead of waiting in line. Boost also holds GPU clocks high when the game is CPU-limited, which helps during large building collapses. On a few systems Boost lowers average FPS; if yours drops noticeably, switch to plain On and keep the latency benefit.

On a Radeon RX 5000 series card or newer, turn on the in-game AMD Anti-Lag 2 toggle and keep your Adrenalin driver current. Anti-Lag 2 is built into the game engine, which makes it more effective than the older driver-only Anti-Lag. When Reflex is active, the NVIDIA Control Panel Low Latency Mode no longer matters, so you do not need to touch it.

2. Use Fullscreen and turn VSync off

Set Window Mode to Fullscreen and VSync to Off. In-game VSync forces the GPU to wait for the monitor’s refresh, and when the frame rate cannot keep up it can add a whole refresh cycle of delay. If you own a G-SYNC or FreeSync monitor, keep variable refresh on; it removes tearing without the classic VSync penalty as long as your frame rate stays inside the monitor’s range.

3. Cap your frame rate below your refresh rate

Use the frame rate limiter in the game’s Video settings, or a driver-level cap if you prefer. The goal is to stop the GPU from hitting 100% load, which is what builds the queue in the first place, and to keep variable refresh engaged.

If your PC cannot reach those numbers in busy fights, set the cap to a value it holds most of the time instead. A stable 120 FPS with GPU headroom often feels more responsive than an uncapped 150 FPS that keeps slamming into a full GPU. NVIDIA users running G-SYNC with VSync forced on in the control panel get an automatic Reflex cap below refresh, so the in-game limiter becomes optional.

4. Keep Frame Generation off

DLSS Frame Generation and AMD FSR 3 Frame Generation insert generated frames between real ones. The counter goes up, but the game has to hold a real frame back to create the in-between image, so responsiveness tracks your base frame rate, not the displayed one. For a competitive shooter, leave both off.

5. Decide on upscaling based on where you are limited

Upscalers are often blamed for input lag, but the real answer depends on your bottleneck. If your GPU is the limit and you sit well below your refresh rate, DLSS, FSR or XeSS on a Quality preset usually lowers total latency because each frame finishes sooner, and that saving outweighs the small processing cost. If you are CPU-limited during destruction-heavy fights, upscaling cannot help, and native resolution with TAAU or no scaling is the cleaner choice. Check your GPU usage in a busy match: well under 90% means CPU-limited.

6. Trim graphics that cost frame time without helping you aim

Set NVIDIA RTX Global Illumination to Static rather than Dynamic, turn Motion Blur and Lens Distortion off, and keep Foliage, Anti-Aliasing and Global Illumination Resolution low. View Distance is worth keeping at Medium or higher so distant players remain visible. Every millisecond you shave off frame time also shortens the latency chain.

Mouse, monitor and Windows checks

• Confirm Windows is actually running your monitor at its full refresh rate under Display settings, Advanced display. A 144 Hz panel left at 60 Hz quietly adds about 10 ms per refresh.
• Raise mouse polling to at least 1000 Hz if your mouse supports it.
• Turn on Game Mode and close capture overlays you do not need while playing ranked.
• Use the monitor’s moderate overdrive setting; the most aggressive mode can add overshoot artifacts without reducing real delay.

Past 1000 Hz the gains are fractions of a millisecond and cost CPU time, which The Finals already uses heavily. On a mid-range processor, 1000 Hz is the sensible ceiling.

Input lag or network lag?

The Finals runs movement, physics and destruction on Embark’s servers, so every player sees the same collapse. That design means some delay you feel is network delay, and no graphics setting will fix it. Use this quick split:

• If your crosshair feels heavy and delayed even in the practice range, it is local input lag. Revisit the steps above.
• If aim feels fine offline but shots register late, opponents warp, or you rubberband, it is network latency. Pick the closest server region, play on wired Ethernet instead of Wi-Fi, and pause large downloads on your network.

How to confirm the changes worked

On a GeForce card, the NVIDIA app performance overlay can show PC Latency in games with Reflex, which gives you a before-and-after number for each change. Make one change at a time in the same practice-range spot, note the figure, and keep whatever lowers it without hurting your frame-rate stability. Radeon owners can use the Adrenalin performance overlay to watch frame time and GPU usage, which confirms whether your cap is leaving headroom.

Quick reference

Apply the steps in order, check your PC Latency or frame-time readout after each one, and you will know exactly which change made the difference on your system.

Hardware That Lowers Input Lag Further

Once the settings above are dialed in, most of the remaining delay in The Finals comes from the monitor and mouse. A higher refresh rate and a high polling-rate mouse are the next steps.

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