High VS Ultra Challenge: Can you actually tell a difference? 

Been saying for years: Ultra is for screenshots, high is for gaming. The few settings I can usually tell a (small) difference between high and ultra in games are textures and draw distance, most other settings I can't notice even if you go down to medium sometimes. The thing to remember when your GPU is getting a bit older is that high or even medium settings in the newest games usually looks better than ultra in games 2+ years old, so the newest games won't look any worse than the older games you could play on ultra, they just won't look as good as the could if you had a stronger GPU.

Ultra is extra marketing for gpus

High for gameplay, ultra for screenshot -Tech Deals

The Virgin Ultra settings Vs. The CHAD High settings.

The main differences are how materials react too lighting conditions. More intensive and accurate normal maps, reflection/rough maps at a higher resolution, so on. (I don’t know what folks call that collection of maps official so I’ll call it detail maps) Thing about models are that they’re actually multiple textures all merged together and working in different ways. The most obvious is a diffused map, which is also the most easiest too run since it’s just paint on a model essentially. The more intensive ones to run are metallic, normals, roughness (and so on, different game engines call them by different names or use different maps all together). These maps are what are called lit maps in Unity, the engine I usually use, and will only interact with the lighting of a scene. The main difference between your usual Ultra and High settings is usually this; the size of said maps. Usually these maps are set to be about half or 3/4 the size of the diffused map as most people won’t be able too tell the difference (bit of a toss up on the normal since that’s the second more notable texture map on a model, although it’s still a lit map). Ultra settings, however, allows for you too max out these maps texture sizes for more texture accurate, sharp reflections. This is most notable in slow camera movements on close up objects, for example on Lara Croft’s blue vest (of course I had to spot the best example there… not doing good for the male stereotype). In the Ultra edition you’re able too see more define bumps in the threading of her shirt as per light sources, likely dictated by a normal and rough map, while in the high preset it’s a lot less noticeable however a AO (ambient occlusion) map is far more prevalent and allows for the lines on the shirt to be seen from literally any direction. I should say what particular maps are being used is down too guess work for me, but in my experience if you’re looking to squeeze more performance out of your game, shrink the detail maps.

I got it right on Red Dead motion shot but fully agree that the difference is really only noticeable at all because we're looking for it.

RU-vid compresses the video so asking people to spot the difference is kinda a useless exercise. Though I am part of the group that feel going from high to ultra is not worth it - for various reasons.

I think there are some specific settings that look especially nice in Ultra. I used to test GR Breakpoint and I’d inevitably end up with a mixture.

I use a mixture of high and ultra. Some graphical settings can be 1-2% difference and sometimes 0% difference but better in visuals

2:00 this is not a confident answer but I think the first one was ultra. The shadows cast from the people in the background were slightly sharper and I thought the illumination from the lanterns looked a bit more natural. But then again I would never notice if I was just playing the game. Edit: I was right but I wouldn’t sacrifice the frame rate for such a minor shading upgrade. Edit 2: my guess for red dead is the second one is ultra. Playing the footage back to back there is a noticeable difference in the sharpness of the shadows and the light reflection but it’s such a small difference that I would never use it during gameplay.

There may be differences, but it's definitely not worth losing so much FPS

ultra been dead for years now sense 2016 games look almost same as the settings below which is high or very high its just a small change I only use high So its still weird to me channels still use max as if they dont know it make no sense to use max

Keep it up man i really enjoy watching your content.

I play almost 3 years on High settings with medium shadows, sometimes post processing to medium and game looks almost same like ultra but fps is higher maybe about such 15-25%

I think going high vs ultra is a bit meaningless. The fact of the matter is you don't just run presets. It's best to optimize settings for best performance while retaining maximum visual fidelity. Min/Maxing if you will. In the case of RDR2 you can run high settings to get better performance, but you'll get better performance running ultra with 3-4 options turned off or down halfway through. In this case you drop tree tesselation, which seems to chonk you anywhere from 10-30% of FPS, water physics to 50%, grass density to 50%, and reflections quality to high. I get averages of about 35-40 fps in benchmark with quality DLSS on ultra, and I get 60-80fps when I turn down those 4 settings. There is almost no visual difference, the biggest being arguably tree appearance, but how often do you stop to inspect bark thickness. In the next gen the biggest meme is gonna come from ray tracing. I strongly believe that running a game on medium with RTX on makes the game look better than ultra with RTX off. Lighting quality is a huge contributor to a scene's perceptibility of reality. If you manage to narrow them down, like shadows, textures, volumetric lighting, ray tracing, then the rest often doesn't matter as much. It's all about how you can trick your brain. If RTX can make minecraft look stunning and realistic despite being made of cubes, than it can make anything look good.

on 4k every thing is a lot more sharp and see way more details between ultra and high. and comparing graphics on 1080p youtube converter is one of the worst ways of doing this test.

It is actually quite noticeable in Rdr2. The high textures look flat out bad for high settings

Tomb raider shadows give away which one is ultra and on red dead the texture of the jacket is a good tell. I agree though while playing the game its hardly noticeable.

RDR 2 is maybe the only game which needs to set textures quality at ultra because below it is too blurry sadly but you're right

The problem is we're comparing different images (left/right split). You need the same image side by side for ultra and high. Same with the video. I did think A was ultra on Tomb Raider, as it looked a little better but that was only 50% certainty as it wasn't massively obvious. And to lose 20FPS, high is the choice especially if ultra FPS would drop more and have 1% very low

I got them all right but it was from deliberately looking at very specific details I normally wouldn't be focused on during a game or even when looking at a still, just to try and see the difference. In the RDR2 ones it was the fur textures on the top of the coat that gave it away but there's absolutely no way anyone would tell if they were just enjoying it and playing the game.

i just found this video because i was with a huge doubt about playing red dead redepmtion 2 on high or ultra settings, my friends told me that in high settings it looked almost the same than ultra and i didn't wanted to believe that, i was with that doubt because on ultra settings my pc run the game at 63-70 fps and sometimes in very specific scenarios it goes down to 37 fps, now that i'm watching this video i think i'm gonna play on high settings, i tried to decieve myself the whole video but i really can't find any difference, i just tried to guess, i also read a ver accurated commentaroy about how ultra settings are meant for screenshots and high for gaming and i think it is true, thanks for the video dude, i know it's two years old and i really don't comment any video i watch usually but this really opened my eyes, new suscriber

Depends on the game and also how optimised it is. I have no problem bumping everything up to Ultra if my fps can stay above 60, and not be a stuttering mess. If there is only a 10 fps difference between high and ultra, I will usually stick to ultra if my frame rate is still good. It's when the fps is 20 + difference compared to high vs ultra that it isn't worth it.

Lately ive been doing that and its actually super fine most of the time cant even tell the difference visually but the framerates thats where the changes are now i basically just turn textures to ultra and everything else to high im on a rx 5600 xt so doing this i get 60 or 60+ fps on 1080p for every game

Overall I agree that at times the differences between high and ultra aren't that different from one another but the performance takes a hit. It depends on the game too of course but in general I agree. I don't know if it's because of the marketing from gpu manufacturers, the benchmark videos or both but it seems to me that there's a good amount of people out there that feel as though they have to play the game at all settings maxed out in order to enjoy it and that's a costly mentality to have but to each their own I guess. I've actually been playing through Metro Exodus Enhanced and of course it looks amazing, especially when you first start playing it but I can't say that I'm enjoying the game more than I did when I played the standard version without ray tracing. As a matter of fact after playing for a while the novelty wore off and I found my self to notice the differences in some cases where the lighting differences are more noticeable. I guess this pretty much sums up how I feel about ray tracing in general as far as it's current implementation in gaming goes. It's not that different from the rasterized version it's something I must have. Minecraft and Quake 2 are the exception.

FPS can also just be a marketing point. Most games do not run any better over 80 to 90 FPS. And ported games like Red Dead 2, do not seem to run any better above a locked 60 FPS. I unlocked the frame rate playing RD2 and only noticed higher temps and power draw.

I’ve never been able to tell ultra from high/very high. But I can tell all the frames that I have by not choosing ultra.

For myself i think: In a high resolutions something above 1080p especially 4k ultra would be pretty good and on a bigger display. But on 1080p is better to stick to high. And how many people even do that? Its not as if everyone runs games on 4k monitors. 1080p is like 90 % probably of users. I think steam had this survery or whatever basically confirming this. And a good graphics card that can run at high settings could likely run the same game even in low and it would look better than a card that can barely push 60.. i think

Ultra is designed for resolutions higher than 1080p so the assets have more detail and data at those higher resolutions. High is industry standard.

Well I'm a crazy person that bought a 3090 so bring on the ultra!

My strategy is to use medium preset at 1080p with DLSS and Frame Gen enabled. Everything else is off. If you compare ultra and medium video side by side, you'll notice little difference in quality. They all look the same. The benefits are massive for playing on medium. The #1 reason is high fps. I however want to cap it to 60 so it won't overwork my gpu. The second reason is less chance the GPU ever overheating and less fan noise.

Tbh, I watched this video in 4K on a high quality monitor and was able to spot the High Settings vs Ultra Settings in moving video. BUT it was very close and if I wasn't actively looking for it, I probably wouldn't have noticed.

This is very true. Certain settings apply more depending on the game and what environments you're dealing with majority of the time. For example things like larger draw distances for foliage, shadows, and level of detail will be more important in games like Ghost Recon Wildlands / Breakpoint than a game like Shadow of the Tomb Raider, even though that game has some larger areas. This is because the Ghost Recon environments are always very open and you're always looking out over a huge distance of land. Even then, ultra is sometimes not necessary as very high might provide the right amount of detail anyways.

It seems a negligible difference between High and Ultra, yes if you scrutinize the monitor you'll see a small difference noticably mainly in fps, but if immersed in a game such as rdr2 it seems fine to play on a Turing card even if you wish you had an Ampere.

I was able to tell on all of them but it's so miniscule of a difference while playing the game I would never notice.

So, I got them all right. I really could tell. That said, the difference is so insignificant that Ultra settings seem pointless. You got me...I'm a convert.

RDR2 look at the shadows on the counter to the left of the register, thats what led me to see the difference.

I think a lot of times developers will make ultra for future gpus, so that they can incentivize people to buy their game later on

resolution is more important than high vs ultra

high/60 since several years. Best configuration without a doubt

rdr 2 has a solid diffrence between high and ultra all the visible changes ive seen is like wood and the ground

The difference between Ultra and High that I can tell is like that of better or worse post processesing of an image. There's ever so slightly smoother textures on Ultra that if you are looking for it, you will see it. I think however given such a subtle difference, it's not worth the loss in frame rate. Ultra is the luxury car that cost alot to maintain, High is the luxury car that a majority can afford to own. - P.S. I pixel peep too much, this is why I have an OLED TV lol. I'm a stickler on haze from LCD screens.

I got them all right but I feel like that's just my experience in 3D software talking, I know what certain features can be expensive and what to look for. Even then, it was hard to tell!

It was easy to spot all the ultra if you game everyday. Stuff like hair, shadows and ambient occlusion is way different

I feel quite proud of being able to make the difference on a 1080p phone despite RU-vid compression but I will still play medium settings 90% of the time. There's no way ultra is worth it unless the game is like 10 years old

This video taught me that, each time, whether moving or not, I preferred the high setting over the ultra........

in the past i've seen things where they show different quality levels and i never see a difference, but it seems like people think it's obvious, so i just chalked it up to my taste in wine (that i have basically no taste and can't tell what's good or not) :-) i think it's more important to me that things look "nice" and that i'm not outright missing things in the distance that might show up in a higher setting (i always worry that's a feature of low quality..but maybe games don't do that and worried about a thing that doesn't happen)

It's all about efficiency and prioritization of visuals. Does adding that higher option deserve the frame cost for the person playing it? Would they trade this option with that option to make the cut to a playable state? I find everyone needs to customize to their own taste. I could sacrifice from shadows and reflections for better LoD, resolution or textures for example. I'll drop motion blur, depth of field and the like as well. There's a lot to fine tune and get adequate performance and quality.

ultra on most games are just for bragging rights

It's the same with Native vs DLSS Quality. I'm trying really hard to spot a difference and I can't. Playing Cyberpunk on High with DLSS Quality and i can't tell a difference between that and Ultra at Native, but the frames are through the roof on a 3070. So yeah sometimes Ultra settings are kinda dumb. In Cyberpunk it lowers only 3 or 4 unimportant settings like clouds and fog.

2:04 i liked how be looked .. i honestly use mixed settings, character detail and textures are on ultra and everything else on high. that's how I play most games. props for the 4k 60fps video ..whats the bitrate do you use to record? i been thinking if FSR is a good implementation , now can we play on ULTRA and get more FPS ??

Id say its more noticeable in game, youtube compression makes it much harder to make out detail

I can see the difference in the realism of the lighting where the ultra looks better every time to me

To tell the difference look at the lighting and reflections look where the light is most intense and youl see a difference in how good it is. Idk you can just tell by the way it is

Super video! Thanks bro

Excellent video, give us more.

1440p ultra vs 4k medium settings? Which one looks better?

Ultra is for when the game is old otherwise dont use it

Ultra is nice but high is top tier I need as much fps while the game still looks good

The big difference appears between the high and ultra in (texture)

I could tell the difference soon as you showed it without me really having to look for it. I don't know if it's because I have a 4K HDR monitor and use to playing on ultra and max out everything in games or what but I notice it alot even me going back to consoles everything seems off.

Great video. What about comparing 4K vs 1440P? How big of a difference is there? As we all know that high demanding games in 4K can't be played above 40-60 FPS depending on the game but how big of a difference there is? Would be great to see that the same way you did this video.

"You may not be able to conscious notice difference, but subconsciously you can" - Jensen Huang

resolution matters way more than settings. if your playing 1080p of course it will look bad. ill take 2k or 4k on medium vs 1080p ultra anyday

But it's completely necessary that I can make out the weathering on the advertising hoarding I shoot past at 200mph whilst looking at something else!

very helpful comparison sir

I could tell which was which only because of Lara's eyes.

Nice content, seem like our teacher back to the PC contents with 1000% effort :))))

some stuff like texture quality or maybe shadow distance, can have noticeable difference during the gameplay, but other settings dont really matter a lot if u dont specifically pay attention to details and compare

For RDR2 there were noticable differences, lighting & material quality stood out to me. But without scrolling back on the video I couldn't tell the difference. For Shadow of the Tomb Raider, I couldn't tell whatsoever.

Did anyone else think this guy was in a black turtle shell costume

Thnax for ur great video Best way to find the ultra or lower one is paying attention to details like beards or textures etc. Overall there is no point to play all games on ultra .

1:17 lol the color of the shirt of the guy with the hat changed 1:33

red dead was more apparent than shadow of the tomb raider, but still very subtle

What gave away the RDR2 to me was the gold pot/urn/whatever that is, reflections on the shelf

Is there a difference between 1080p High Settings and 1080p Ultra Settings in image Quallity? P.S. I have 23.8"inc, 1080pFull HD monitor, 144Hz

I can say WITH CONFIDENCE that I got literally every example wrong... This guy might be on to something. Lmao

Is it just me, or was 2006-2010ish timeframe the era where there was just Low, Medium, and High and there was a potent tell in those 3 settings?

i always cap my games at a certain fps while gaming and i play destiny 2! I had fun playing games at 70fps on max or ultra settings it was nice but it always leads to disappointment like i always end up not being happy about my fps. I noticed the picture doesn't look any different between the two just ultra higher up post effects like lighting and stuff when they look good on high anyways. destiny 2 i went from 80fps to 100fps with better frame times going to high! ultra is mainly used for advertisement to show off the graphics so its mainly used for videos but a true 4k experience in gaming for fun go high. Also I did notice Ultra or Max turns sharpness related settings to the max which also lead me seeing artifacts from a certain distance on high everything feels smooth and medium softens it even more.

Ultra is for screenshot

Very High, Bro Am I Joke To You?

great video. thanks, mate

RDR2 I play it on almost the highest graphics settings at 1080p x 5/4 resolution when it dips below 60 it's not really noticeable. The biggest FPS draw was the water physics, so i go just under full on that. I turn down to high the far away effects. The most beautiful stuff that impresses is close up anyway. I'm rockin a RX 6750 XT and a Ryzen 7 5800x. It's great for 1080p gaming and even allows for decent raytracing in most titles.

High looks more fluid. I think from now on, I'm gonna choose framerate over image quality, in the end, High looks amazing too.

I could tell, but I feel like I’m missing a part of my soul because of it. In any event great video idea! edit: got the first red dead incorrect

bro I got every shot good, but yeah I get the point. I mean it cost almost nothing to add ultra settings so why not just do it for pumped pc ?

Ultra = Not worth It High = PC Medium = Playstation and Xbox Low = Switch

Didn't even notice A and B on screen, let alone the difference in visual fidelity.

I have got a 165hz 1440p monitor. If I use high settings I can see screen tear on my monitor. I have to use ultra so it doesn't happen

The only time I use ulta for all settings is if I see no performance difference if high and ultra in any game is giving me the same if not nearly the same performance why wouldn't I just stick with ultra it only matters if there is a performance benefit besides that the only other reason to not use ultra is to keep the system and/or the GPU from running as hard which in turn keeps your system and gpu cooler and quieter unless it's still the same temp going from ultra to high then again no point just stick with the higher setting.

On ultra the game looks softer and the reflections look sharper, also you can see jagged edges between the 2.

You can see the difference mostly in nature imo and when looking at distant objects. I specifically know that rdr2 has a problem where shadows pop in as youre getting closer and if you're looking over a meadow or something you can clearly see the unshaded part but if you're on ultra you cant. For me that seriously brakes the immersion but if i had to choose 90fps on high or 60 on ultra, I'd go for high.

It's noticeable with little thing like furs on the coat and hair details

i would say Ultra at 1080p is doable for years to come with a high end GPU unless it's tha RTX 4000 series with tha stupid 16pin power connector and there's been new reports where even if tha connector is plugged in all tha way, it still burns

well u have a point there and in totally agree with it

Guessing 2:04 A:High B: Ultra . Edit: Guess what, I was wrong! 😅. Am happy that difference is not perceivable

Got them all right. Not cause high looked bad but cause I was really lucky with the guesses lmao

Ok, the one in motion was impossible to guess for me.

The only time you should choose ultra is if you're getting steady 80+fps (unless its a competitive shooter then 80 is on the low end of what you'll be aiming for). Otherwise going for high will always be your best option.

man I was hoping I wouldn't notice it but I did...thanks now I have to spend more money...