Battlefield 6 won’t support ray tracing — here’s why EA is prioritizing performance for all players

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For gamers with high-end PCs, it might be a letdown that Battlefield 6 doesn’t support ray tracing at its release. However, the rationale behind this choice becomes clearer upon understanding it.

Battlefield 6 is slated for release on October 10, 2025, after a highly successful beta test spanning multiple weekends. Countless players eagerly lined up in the menus, demonstrating the immense excitement surrounding the series’ comeback.

As an analyst, I’ve recently gained insights into the reasons why the striking visual elements such as ray tracing won’t be incorporated in the user experience.

Why Battlefield 6 is skipping ray tracing

Christian Buhl, the developer, has confirmed that Battlefield 6 does not plan to include ray tracing at its release or within the immediate future. This choice was made during the early stages of development.

The game won’t feature ray-tracing at launch, and currently, we don’t have plans to implement it in the immediate term.

Christian Buhl

As an analyst, I can share that the studio emphasized their intention to direct resources towards enhancing the game’s performance and ensuring platform compatibility. By prioritizing these aspects, they aimed to make the game accessible to a wide range of players across various systems. Introducing ray tracing would primarily have catered to high-end PC gamers, potentially overlooking a significant portion of the audience.

It’s great that Battlefield 6 appears visually stunning so far, but its emphasis on accessibility is especially noteworthy. In the high-speed world of multiplayer gaming, maintaining a smooth frame rate seems more crucial than elaborate visual effects – at least from my perspective.

Making the game accessible on lower-spec PCs

During the beta testing phase, many players running Battlefield 6 on hardware that fell below the game’s minimum requirements was observed by developers. The studio had already expected this, so they focused on ensuring optimal performance for low-end systems while developing the game.

While Battlefield 6 uses a different engine, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney emphasized a similar approach for Unreal Engine 5. His advice is to initially develop games with lower-performance hardware in mind first. This strategy is based on the idea that if a game performs well on less powerful hardware, it will optimize even better when run on high-end systems.

To ensure optimal performance of Battlefield 6 on various PC configurations, adjustments were made to maps, assets, and engine optimizations. Moreover, the game offers over 600 graphical and accessibility options, allowing users to customize settings meticulously for maximum hardware efficiency.

For the 2025 release, the system specifications are quite approachable. A minimum Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) requirement is an RTX 2060, enabling gameplay at 1080p with 30 frames per second (fps). If you want a smoother 60fps experience, the recommended GPU is an RTX 3060 Ti, which can be found for around $250 or lower if you opt for a refurbished model or search for discounts.

Performance on consoles and player feedback

As a researcher immersed in gaming, I’ve had the pleasure of exploring various platforms, and none have been more reliable than the Xbox Series X. During my playtime on this powerhouse console, performance remained consistently stable with no perceptible drops. Interestingly, both the Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5 demonstrated a commendable ability to maintain a steady 60fps, even in scenarios that typically push hardware limits.

As a tech enthusiast, I’ve been diving into the current-gen consoles, and during the beta testing, I found myself making use of the Performance Mode. With Variable Refresh Rate (VRR) technology, this mode amps up the frame rates beyond 60fps, delivering an exceptionally smooth gaming experience. In fact, the game has garnered high praises from tech giants like Digital Foundry for its exceptional polish.

Despite the franchise’s distinctive feature of collapsible environments being activated, the game ran smoothly without any hiccups. Feedback from the pre-release testing has been predominantly favorable, with very few complaints about technical issues across different platforms. Compared to Battlefield 2042’s infamous rocky beta launch, this shows significant enhancement.

Is Call of Duty feeling the heat?

The unified launcher for Call of Duty, known as CoD HQ, has significantly reduced its storage requirement on PlayStation 5, going from 126GB to only 25GB. Similarly, on Xbox, Modern Warfare II and III have been separated from CoD HQ, resulting in a smaller installation size for those games too.

Compared to modern standards, the file size for Battlefield 6 spans between 55GB and 80GB across different platforms, a relatively small range. Both series appear to be catering to player preferences in terms of both storage and theme. Notably, Call of Duty has announced that skins from Black Ops 6 will not transfer over to Black Ops 7, a move driven by player feedback seeking a more authentic gameplay experience, as the previous skins had introduced an element of eccentricity to the CoD franchise.

Despite Black Ops 7 coming out before it, I’m more eagerly anticipating Battlefield 6, as a fan who appreciates CoD Zombies too. Recently, the Call of Duty formula feels less fresh to me, and that includes my dad, who has played every single one up to this point; he’s chosen Battlefield 6 over Black Ops 7 for 2021.

Over the course of time, we’ll find out which video game franchise will be number one, or perhaps they can both thrive side by side, since Battlefield’s realistic gameplay may not attract those who enjoy the more action-packed style of Call of Duty.

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2025-09-01 17:43