Microsoft Flight Simulator

FAQ

Q: What is the highest settings preset this PC can run at 1920x1080 while staying above 60 FPS?

A: The highest preset that clears the 60 FPS threshold at 1920x1080 is High, with an average of 60.3 FPS. Ultra falls short at 53.3 FPS, Medium reaches 79.4 FPS, and Low runs at 100 FPS.

Q: Can this combo handle 4K resolution in Microsoft Flight Simulator?

A: At 3840x2160, only the Low preset stays above 60 FPS, achieving an average of 60.9 FPS. Medium drops to 48.5 FPS, High to 36.5 FPS, and Ultra to 32.6 FPS, so higher presets are not playable at this resolution.

Q: What is the best playable settings preset at 2560x1440?

A: The best preset at 2560x1440 that stays at or above 60 FPS is Medium, which delivers an average of 65.5 FPS. Low runs at 81.9 FPS, but High and Ultra fall below the threshold at 49 FPS and 46.4 FPS respectively.

Q: How does this system rank among all tested hardware combinations for this game?

A: The combination of the Intel Core i5-11400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER ranks 2490 out of 3714 tested combos in Microsoft Flight Simulator, placing it in the lower half of the database.

Q: What is the average benchmark score of the RTX 2060 SUPER compared to its nearest rival?

A: The GPU has an average benchmark score of 18093, while its closest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Mobile, scores 18159, a difference of 0.4 percent. The RTX 2060 SUPER sits at the 62nd percentile among all GPUs.

Q: What is the average benchmark score of the CPU compared to its nearest rival?

A: The Intel Core i5-11400F has an average benchmark score of 17177, while its nearest rival, the AMD EPYC 7H12, scores 17120, a delta of 0.3 percent. The CPU sits at the 71st percentile among all CPUs.

CPU and GPU Roles

The recorded data for Microsoft Flight Simulator reveals a clear pattern: the GPU becomes the dominant constraint as resolution climbs, while the CPU appears to hold the system back less at lower resolutions. At 1920x1080, the frame rate scales steeply with settings, going from 100 FPS at Low to 79.4 FPS at Medium, then 60.3 FPS at High, and finally 53.3 FPS at Ultra. This progression suggests that at 1080p, the rendering workload is still light enough that the GPU is not fully saturated, and the CPU can keep up with the flight simulation's simulation and physics threads. The gap between Low and Ultra at 1080p is 46.7 FPS, which is a large swing and points to the GPU handling most of the graphical load as settings increase.

Moving to 2560x1440, the same settings order produces 81.9 FPS at Low, 65.5 FPS at Medium, 49 FPS at High, and 46.4 FPS at Ultra. The drop from Low to Medium is 16.4 FPS, and from Medium to High it is another 16.5 FPS, but the High to Ultra step is only 2.6 FPS. This compression at the top end suggests that at 1440p, the GPU is starting to become the limiting factor, and the extra visual fidelity from Ultra over High does not cost as much performance as the jump from Medium to High. The CPU contribution here is less visible because the GPU is doing more work per frame.

At 3840x2160, the trend intensifies. Low runs at 60.9 FPS, Medium at 48.5 FPS, High at 36.5 FPS, and Ultra at 32.6 FPS. The scaling between Low and Medium is 12.4 FPS, Medium to High is 12 FPS, and High to Ultra is only 3.9 FPS. At 4K, the pixel count dominates the rendering cost, and the RTX 2060 SUPER's 8 GB of GDDR6 memory and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth become the clear bottleneck. The CPU's role fades because the frame rate is limited by the GPU's fill rate and shader throughput rather than by the processor's ability to feed the simulation.

Comparing resolutions at the same settings reveals the GPU's increasing influence. At Low settings, the frame rate drops from 100 FPS at 1080p to 81.9 FPS at 1440p, then to 60.9 FPS at 4K. That is a 39.1 FPS reduction from 1080p to 4K at Low. At Ultra settings, the drop is from 53.3 FPS at 1080p to 46.4 FPS at 1440p, then to 32.6 FPS at 4K, a 20.7 FPS reduction. The smaller absolute drop at Ultra suggests that at high settings, the game is already heavily GPU-bound even at 1080p, so raising resolution does not multiply the cost as much as it does at Low. At Low settings, the CPU can feed frames quickly, and the GPU's workload scales more directly with pixel count.

The data implies that for this specific pairing, the RTX 2060 SUPER is the component that determines playability at higher resolutions. The i5-11400F, with its 6 cores and 12 threads, has enough multithreaded capacity to keep up at 1080p and even at 1440p Medium, but the GPU cannot maintain 60 FPS at 1440p High or at 4K Medium and above. The CPU's 71st percentile ranking among all CPUs versus the GPU's 62nd percentile also supports the idea that the GPU is the weaker link in this pairing. Players aiming for higher settings should look toward the GPU side of the equation, while the CPU is unlikely to be the primary source of frame rate drops in this title.

Best Settings per Resolution

At 3840x2160, the only preset that stays at or above 60 FPS is Low, with an average of 60.9 FPS. No other 4K preset reaches the threshold, so Low is the recommended setting for 4K play.

At 2560x1440, the most demanding preset that maintains 60 FPS or higher is Medium, delivering an average of 65.5 FPS. Low also clears the threshold at 81.9 FPS, but Medium offers better visual quality while still staying above the playable line.

At 1920x1080, High is the best playable preset, with an average of 60.3 FPS. Low and Medium also exceed 60 FPS, at 100 FPS and 79.4 FPS respectively, but High provides the highest visual fidelity among playable options. Ultra falls short at 53.3 FPS.

The Verdict

The recorded data shows that this PC can run Microsoft Flight Simulator, but the playable envelope depends heavily on resolution and settings. At 1920x1080, the system clears 60 FPS on Low, Medium, and High presets, with High being the best visual option at 60.3 FPS. At 2560x1440, Low and Medium both stay above 60 FPS, with Medium providing the best balance at 65.5 FPS. At 3840x2160, only Low achieves a playable average of 60.9 FPS. The verdict is clear: this combo is a solid 1080p High performer, a capable 1440p Medium performer, and only marginally playable at 4K on the lowest preset. Ultra settings are not playable at any resolution, with the closest being 53.3 FPS at 1080p. The system ranks 2490 out of 3714 combos, which places it in the lower half of tested configurations for this game, but the specific settings that clear 60 FPS are sufficient for most players who prioritize smooth framerates over maximum visual detail.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 3840x2160, the recorded average frame rates are 60.9 FPS at Low, 48.5 FPS at Medium, 36.5 FPS at High, and 32.6 FPS at Ultra. The minimum and maximum FPS values were not recorded for any of these entries, so only the averages are available for analysis.

At 2560x1440, the average frame rates are 81.9 FPS at Low, 65.5 FPS at Medium, 49 FPS at High, and 46.4 FPS at Ultra. Again, no minimum or maximum values were recorded.

At 1920x1080, the average frame rates are 100 FPS at Low, 79.4 FPS at Medium, 60.3 FPS at High, and 53.3 FPS at Ultra. The 1080p Low result is the highest average in the entire dataset, and the 4K Ultra result at 32.6 FPS is the lowest.

The pattern across all resolutions is consistent: Low always yields the highest frame rate, Ultra always the lowest, and the gap between Medium and High is generally larger than the gap between High and Ultra. The largest single-step drop in the dataset is from 1080p Low at 100 FPS to 1080p Medium at 79.4 FPS, a 20.6 FPS reduction. The smallest single-step drop is from 1440p High at 49 FPS to 1440p Ultra at 46.4 FPS, a 2.6 FPS reduction.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested hardware combinations for Microsoft Flight Simulator, this pairing of the Intel Core i5-11400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER ranks 2490 out of 3714 combos. That places it in the 67th percentile of tested systems, meaning roughly one-third of tested configurations are slower and two-thirds are faster. The CPU itself sits at the 71st percentile among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 17177. The GPU sits at the 62nd percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 18093. The gap between the CPU's percentile and the GPU's percentile suggests that the RTX 2060 SUPER is the component that holds this system back in the database's ranking. The measured frame rates confirm this: at 1080p High, the system only just clears 60 FPS, and at 1440p High it falls below 60 FPS entirely. A stronger GPU would likely move this combo higher in the rankings, while a stronger CPU would have less impact given the GPU-bound nature of the game at higher settings.

Similar Performance Alternatives

The nearest rivals for the Intel Core i5-11400F in the database are the AMD EPYC 7H12, the Intel Core i5-12450H, the AMD Ryzen 3 PRO 8300G, and the Intel Core Ultra 7 164U. The AMD EPYC 7H12 has an average score of 17120, which is 0.3 percent lower than the i5-11400F's 17177, making it essentially equivalent in CPU performance. The Intel Core i5-12450H scores 17239, 0.4 percent higher, while the AMD Ryzen 3 PRO 8300G scores 17278, 0.6 percent higher. The Intel Core Ultra 7 164U scores 17074, 0.6 percent lower. These deltas are all within one percent, so any of these CPUs would produce nearly identical frame rates in Microsoft Flight Simulator when paired with the same GPU, assuming the rest of the system is similar.

The nearest rivals for the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER are the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Mobile, the AMD Radeon Pro 5700, the AMD Radeon RX 460, and the Intel Arc A770M. The RTX 3060 Mobile scores 18159, 0.4 percent higher than the RTX 2060 SUPER's 18093, making it the closest match. The AMD Radeon Pro 5700 scores 18189, 0.5 percent higher, while the AMD Radeon RX 460 scores 18373, 1.5 percent higher, and the Intel Arc A770M scores 18383, 1.6 percent higher. All of these GPUs fall within a 1.6 percent band of the RTX 2060 SUPER, so swapping to any of them would likely yield nearly identical performance in this game. The implications are straightforward: the i5-11400F and RTX 2060 SUPER sit in a dense cluster of similar hardware, and users with any of these neighboring components should expect comparable behavior in Microsoft Flight Simulator at the settings and resolutions examined here.