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Star Citizen · Custom Gaming PCs

Best Gaming PCs for Star Citizen

Star Citizen is brutally CPU-bound and leans hard on single-thread speed and cache, so an X3D chip can lift 1% lows by 30 to 50 per cent in busy hub cities like Area18.

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Target Entry1080p

1080p

100+ fps, High settings

Target framerate

Recommended GPU

RTX 5060 Ti / RX 9060 XT

Target Sweet Spot1440p

1440p

90 to 120+ fps, High settings

Target framerate

Recommended GPU

RTX 5070 Ti / RX 9070 XT

Target Ultra4K

4K

60 to 90+ fps, High settings

Target framerate

Recommended GPU

RTX 5080 / RTX 5090

At a glance

Star Citizen Performance

Star Citizen is brutally CPU-bound and leans hard on single-thread speed and cache, so an X3D chip can lift 1% lows by 30 to 50 per cent in busy hub cities like Area18. It is also VRAM and RAM hungry, wanting 32GB of system memory and a fast NVMe SSD, with plenty of headroom for high-refresh, 4K or triple-screen sim setups.

In-depth

Everything you need to know

Hardware breakdown, build recommendations, and tuning advice for Star Citizen.

Star Citizen is Cloud Imperium's vast, ever-evolving online space sim, a single seamless universe where you can fly a ship out of a planet's atmosphere, dock at a sprawling space station, trade cargo, mine asteroids, fight bounties or simply walk around bustling cities with thousands of other players. There are no loading screens between worlds, the physics are dizzyingly detailed and the persistent universe keeps growing, which is exactly why it remains one of the most demanding games you can install. Getting smooth, immersive performance out of it is less about brute force in one place and more about a properly balanced machine, and that is precisely what we love building.

Star Citizen System Requirements

Minimum

OS: Windows 10 64-bit (latest build) or Windows 11 Processor: Intel Core i7-4720HQ or AMD Ryzen 5 2600X (quad core with AVX, AVX2 and FMA3) Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 or AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT (4GB VRAM, DirectX 11.1 and Vulkan 1.2 support) Memory: 16GB Storage: 150GB SSD (NVMe strongly recommended)

Recommended

OS: Windows 11 64-bit Processor: Intel Core i7-12700K or AMD Ryzen 7 5800X Graphics: DirectX 12 GPU with 8GB VRAM (NVIDIA RTX 3060 or AMD RX 6700 XT class) Memory: 32GB Storage: 150GB NVMe SSD

FAQ

Common questions

What graphics card do I need for Star Citizen at 1440p?

For a comfortable 1440p experience on High settings we would point you at an NVIDIA RTX 5070 Ti or an AMD RX 9070 XT. Both have plenty of grunt and, just as importantly, the VRAM Star Citizen likes to gobble up in dense areas. If you want extra headroom for the busiest cities and future updates, an RTX 5080 is a lovely step up. Every CREATE PCs machine is hand built to order in Stevenage, so we can match the card to your monitor and budget rather than selling you more than you need.

Is Star Citizen more CPU or GPU intensive?

Both matter, but Star Citizen is unusually CPU-bound and leans heavily on single-thread speed and cache. That makes AMD's X3D chips, such as the Ryzen 7 9800X3D or Ryzen 9 9950X3D, genuinely transformative, lifting your 1% lows and smoothing out the stutter in packed hub cities by anywhere from 30 to 50 per cent. An Intel Core Ultra 9 285K is a strong alternative. We always pair a fast CPU with a capable GPU so neither holds the other back.

How much RAM does Star Citizen need?

The official minimum is 16GB, but in honesty that is just enough to launch the game. In a typical session Star Citizen routinely uses 20 to 25GB, so 32GB is the real-world figure we fit as standard and the sweet spot for smooth play. Heavy multi-tasking streamers might consider 64GB, though most players will not need it. A quick fast NVMe SSD is also a must, not optional, as the game streams its enormous universe constantly.

Can you build a PC for triple-screen or VR sim setups?

Absolutely, and it is one of our favourite jobs. Driving Star Citizen across triple monitors or in VR multiplies the pixels your GPU has to push, so we would recommend a 16GB-plus card like the RTX 5080 or RTX 5090, backed by a top X3D CPU and 32GB of RAM. We can also factor in HOTAS sticks, pedals and the right ports when we build it. Tell us your setup and we will spec a balanced rig, hand built to order with our 5 year warranty.

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