Baldur’s Gate 3 System Requirements: Minimum & Recommended PC Specs

The Baldur’s Gate 3 system requirements call for at minimum a Core i5-4690 or FX-8350 CPU, a GTX 970 or RX 480 GPU, 8GB of RAM, and 150GB of SSD storage — an SSD is not optional, Larian lists it as a hard requirement. For the recommended experience (high/ultra settings, 1080p60), you’ll want a Core i7-8700K or Ryzen 5 3600, an RTX 2060 Super or RX 5700 XT, and 16GB of RAM. Below is the full breakdown, plus what nobody tells you about Act 3 slowdown and split-screen co-op.

Since launching in August 2023, Baldur’s Gate 3 has kept adding content through free patches, and Larian has quietly raised the bar on what a comfortable playthrough needs. If you last checked the spec sheet at launch, treat the numbers below as the current, patched baseline rather than the day-one requirements.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Minimum System Requirements

These are the lowest specs Larian Studios certifies for Baldur’s Gate 3 to run, generally at low-to-medium settings around 1080p30. Even at minimum, the game still expects a solid-state drive — more on why below.

• OS: Windows 10 64-bit
• CPU: Intel Core i5-4690 / AMD FX-8350 (must support AVX2, so no CPUs older than roughly 2014)
• RAM: 8GB
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 / AMD Radeon RX 480 (4GB+ VRAM)
• DirectX: Version 11
• Storage: 150GB available space (SSD required)

Baldur’s Gate 3 Recommended System Requirements

Recommended specs are what Larian targets for high/ultra settings and a stable 60fps in most areas outside the notoriously demanding Act 3 city. A hexacore CPU makes a bigger difference here than raw GPU horsepower, since BG3’s turn-based combat, dialogue systems, and crowd simulation lean heavily on the processor. These figures match Larian’s own official system requirements page.

• OS: Windows 10 64-bit
• CPU: Intel Core i7-8700K / AMD Ryzen 5 3600
• RAM: 16GB
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 Super / AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT (8GB+ VRAM)
• DirectX: Version 11
• Storage: 150GB available space (SSD required)

Minimum vs Recommended: Side-by-Side Comparison

Why Baldur’s Gate 3 Requires an SSD

Unlike most system requirement lists that merely suggest an SSD, Baldur’s Gate 3 lists it as a genuine requirement at both minimum and recommended tiers. The game streams an enormous amount of dialogue, cinematic, and level data in real time as you move through Faerûn, and a mechanical hard drive simply can’t keep up. Players who install on an HDD report loading hitches, texture pop-in, and even hard freezes during busy scenes — problems that mostly disappear on any SATA or NVMe SSD. If you’re still running BG3 off a spinning hard drive, upgrading storage will do more for your experience than a GPU bump. The official Steam store page states the SSD requirement plainly rather than as a soft suggestion, which is unusual for a game this size.

Should You Upgrade Your PC Just for Baldur’s Gate 3?

If you’re sitting right at the minimum spec, the single upgrade with the best payoff is almost always storage, not the graphics card. Moving the install from an HDD to any SSD eliminates most of the stutter players blame on their GPU. After that, RAM is the next cheapest win: going from 8GB to 16GB matters more for BG3’s dialogue and save-state loading than most action games, because the game keeps a large amount of quest and companion state in memory during long sessions. Only reach for a GPU upgrade last, and mainly if you’re chasing higher resolutions or want headroom for Act 3’s crowd-heavy scenes at a stable frame rate.

Act 3 Performance: Why Frame Rates Drop in Baldur’s Gate City

If your frame rate is fine in the Act 1 wilderness and Act 2’s Shadow-Cursed Lands but tanks once you reach the city of Baldur’s Gate in Act 3, that’s expected — not a sign your PC is broken. Act 3 packs hundreds of simultaneously simulated NPCs, shops, and side-quest triggers into a dense urban map, and that crowd simulation is a heavy CPU load rather than a GPU one, which is why even high-end rigs see a bigger dip here than anywhere else in the game. Earthquake sequences and busy market districts make it worse.

A few settings changes noticeably help on mid-range hardware:

1. Set Dynamic Crowds to Off or Low (frees up several percent of frame time).
2. Lower Instance Distance and Model Quality in the graphics menu.
3. Use the DirectX 11 renderer rather than Vulkan, which is generally more stable in Act 3 on most GPUs.
4. Close background apps and overlays to free up CPU headroom for NPC pathing and dialogue systems.

Split-Screen Co-Op: What It Actually Needs

Baldur’s Gate 3 supports two-player split-screen local co-op on PC, but it comes with its own requirements on top of the base spec sheet. Both players need controllers — split-screen currently doesn’t support mixing mouse-and-keyboard with a gamepad for the second player. Running two simultaneous camera views effectively doubles the rendering workload, so Steam’s own listing notes that split-screen will not run at an acceptable level of performance on minimum specs. In practice, the game may also cap split-screen sessions at 30fps to keep both views smooth, even on rigs that hit 60fps solo. If couch co-op is your main use case, aim for recommended specs or better, not the bare minimum.

How to Check If Your PC Can Run Baldur’s Gate 3

1. Check your CPU generation and core count against the tables above — hexacore CPUs age much better than quad-core for Act 3.
2. Confirm your GPU’s VRAM: 4GB is the real floor, 8GB avoids texture streaming stutter at 1080p and up.
3. Verify you have at least 150GB free on an SSD, not an HDD.
4. Update GPU drivers and Windows before installing — BG3 patches frequently and older drivers cause crashes in Act 3 cutscenes.

Where to Buy Baldur’s Gate 3

Once your PC clears the spec check, the fastest way to get playing is a genuine Steam key. NDWS Market stocks official Baldur’s Gate 3 and other PC game keys at a discount versus the Steam storefront price, delivered instantly after checkout and redeemable directly through your existing Steam library — no separate launcher, no shady reseller middleman. Browse the full NDWS Market shop for more genuine game and software keys, or check the video games category for other RPGs and Larian titles. Have a question about redemption or refunds first? Our FAQ page covers key delivery, activation, and region locking before you buy.

Baldur’s Gate 3 System Requirements FAQ

Can my PC run Baldur’s Gate 3 with 8GB RAM?
Yes, 8GB is the official minimum, but expect stutter in busy Act 3 scenes and multiplayer; 16GB is the practical sweet spot for smooth play.

Does Baldur’s Gate 3 really need an SSD, or is that just a suggestion?
It’s a real requirement, not a soft recommendation — Larian lists SSD storage at both minimum and recommended tiers because the game streams data too fast for a mechanical hard drive to keep up.

Why does Baldur’s Gate 3 lag so much in Act 3?
Act 3 takes place in the dense city of Baldur’s Gate with hundreds of simulated NPCs, which is a heavy CPU load; lowering Dynamic Crowds and Instance Distance, and using DirectX 11, helps most mid-range systems.

Can you play Baldur’s Gate 3 split-screen on PC?
Yes, two-player split-screen co-op is supported on PC, but both players need controllers and the game may run at 30fps in split-screen even on machines that hit 60fps solo; minimum-spec PCs are not recommended for it.

What GPU do I need for 1080p60 in Baldur’s Gate 3?
An RTX 2060 Super, RX 5700 XT, or newer with 8GB+ VRAM comfortably hits high settings at 1080p60 outside the heaviest Act 3 crowd scenes.

Is Baldur’s Gate 3 CPU-intensive or GPU-intensive?
Both matter, but the CPU is the bigger bottleneck in Act 3 and in large multiplayer sessions because of dialogue systems, turn-based combat logic, and crowd simulation; the GPU load scales more with resolution and graphics settings.